Fallen Angel: Avengers Assemble
by MotoXAngels
Summary: After Loki's death, Arabella is now living in New York. After getting on SHIELD's radar in a bad way, she now works for them. When a new evil baring an old face, threatens the world, Arabella and her new friends are called upon to save it. Will an old face bring up a painful past? How will the Angel react when brought face-to-face with the man who haunts her dreams?
1. Nightmares

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

"And there came a day, a day unlike any other, when Earth's mightiest heroes and heroines found themselves united against a common threat. On that day, the Avengers were born—to fight the foes no single superhero could withstand! Through the years, their roster has prospered, changing many times, but their glory had never been denied! Heed the call, then—for now, the Avengers Assemble!"

* * *

_Burning blue flames surround my mind. A smoky cube shape emerges—THE TESSERACT. Then blackness fills everything._

_Trapped mortals and destruction fills my vision, screams of anguish fill my ears, the copper smell of blood fills my nose, and the taste of black smoke sticks to the inside of my mouth like glue._

* * *

I wake suddenly, bolting up in bed, sweat dripping from every inch of my lithe body. I run a shaky hand through my waist length blood red hair, feeling the stickiness and tangles matting it. I feel wetness on my face, wiping my cheeks I realize it's my tears, I had been crying in my sleep.

I crack my neck feeling the protest of my muscles against the movement. I throw the covers from my body as I stand up stretching my tight muscles. My shoulders pop as I reach my arms over my head, as do my knees and ankles as I walk to my bathroom. The sounds my body gives off in the mornings would make any normal person cringe… Good thing I'm not normal—

I feel my wings break free from the skin of my back, stretching their 12 foot wingspan from wall to wall of my bedroom.

—Nor am I human.

* * *

A planet, in the far reaches of space, the exterior of a throne room – Night.

Kneeling behind a throne, a clothed, armored figure known as The Other, bows.

"The Tesseract has awakened. It is on a little world. A human world. They would wield its power…"

"But our ally knows its workings as they never will." The Other faces a horned shaped shadow. Loki, the Norse God of Mischief and Lies. Loki is handed the Chitauri Scepter, a long golden handle, fitted with a blue gem encircled with silver blades. "He is ready to lead. And our force, our Chitauri, will follow."

Before them tens of thousands of Chitauri stand at the ready in a seething mass of nest rows and columns… the ground simply quakes.

"The world will be his. The universe yours. And the humans, what can they do but burn?"


	2. A New Threat

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

Exterior S.H.I.E.L.D. Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S. Facility – Night

* * *

Out in the New Mexico desert, a remote research facility is in a state of panic. It's an evacuation. A swooping helicopter flies in. Chaos. Men in suits run around like in the typical 'we have to leave' fashion. Soldiers on foot jump into Humvees, accelerating the hell out of there. A voice bellows from hidden loudspeakers.

Standing a few yards from the landing pad, a Fed in a suit with badass shades, peers at the helicopter as it lands. This is SHIELD Agent Phil Coulson.

Walking out of the helicopter is SHIELD Agent Maria Hill, sexy, fierce and determined. Following her, SHIELD Director Nick Fury climbs out, they approach Agent Coulson.

"How bad is it?" Director Fury asks as he stops in front of the smaller man.

Agent Coulson sighs removing his glasses, "That's the problem, Sir. We don't know."

The enter the facility, stepping into an elevator that takes them deep beneath the surface. He leads the way into the facility, through the radiation section. Hundreds of technicians and other staff run around, taking only the essentials

"Dr. Selvig read an energy surge from the Tesseract four hours ago."

"NASA didn't authorize Selvig to go to test phase."

"He wasn't testing it. He wasn't even in the room. Spontaneous event."

"It just turned itself on?" Agent Hill asked, speaking up for the first time as she followed behind the two men.

"Where are the energy levels now?"

"Climbing. When Selvig couldn't shut it down, we ordered the evac."

"How long to get everyone out?"

"Campus should be clear in the next half-hour."

"Do better."

Agent Coulson nods heading back to speed up the evac, while the Director and Agent Hill head down a long staircase to the radiation facility floor.

"Sir, evacuation may be futile."

"We should tell them to go back to sleep?"

"If we can't control the Tesseract's energy, there may not be a minimum safe distance."

"I need you to make sure that PHASE 2 prototypes are shipped out." Fury says stopping at the bottom of the staircase.

"Sir, is that really a priority right now?"

"Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on. Clear out the tech below. Every piece of PHASE 2 on a truck and gone."

"Yes Sir." Turning to the two Agents standing by, "With me."

* * *

Fury enters the NASA Space Radiation facility, vacuum chamber where the Tesseract is being held by a compact muon solenoid coil chamber.

"Talk to me, Doctor."

Dr. Erik Selvig emerges from behind the CMS machine, concerned. The Tesseract is glowing unusually brighter and flare rings shoot out at random.

"Director."

"Is there anything we know for certain?"

"The Tesseract is misbehaving."

"Is that supposed to be funny?"

"No, it's not funny at all. The Tesseract is not only active, she's… behaving"

"I assume you pulled the plug?"

"She's an energy source. We turn off the power, she turns it back on. If she reaches peak level…"

"We prepared for this, Doctor. Harnessing energy from space."

"But we don't have the harness. My calculations are far from complete. And she's throwing off interference, radiation. Nothing harmful, low levels of gamma radiation."

"That can be harmful. Where's Agent Barton?"

Selvig scoffs, "The Hawk? Up in his nest, as usual."

Fury looks up to the roof where the Doctor indicated, Agent Clint Barton, dressed in black tactical gear, is sitting down leaning on the railings watching them below. Fury calls Barton on his earpiece, "Agent Barton, report."

Hawk rappels down from the catwalk and walks up to Fury. They both walk around the facility in a discreet manner.

* * *

"I gave you this detail so you could keep a close eye on things."

"Well, I see better from a distance."

"Are you seeing anything that might set this thing off?"

"Doctor, it's spiking again." A scientist reports to Dr. Selvig behind them.

"No one's come or gone. And Selvig's clean. No contacts, no IM's. If there was any tampering, Sir, it wasn't at this end."

"At this end?"

"Yeah, the cube is a doorway to the other end of space, right? Doors open from both sides."

Dr. Selvig clacks away the keyboard and sees on the monitoring his worst nightmares. Suddenly—the Tesseract thunders and shakes the entire facility. Big enough where both Agents Hill and Coulson can feel and they're at different ends of the facility. The flaring rings and glow of the cube spout out brighter and louder, like a boiling pot of water. The Tesseract's energy builds up into a beam much like the Bifrost Bridge, which hits at the end of a platform that is wired to the CMS device. The great maelstrom beam fires the Tesseract energy. The beam then forms a vortex, which then opens up a portal.

A black hole is created. From the portal, the blackness of space, beautiful and mysterious, strewn with a billion stars appears and a gust of blue energy clouds fill the room, blinding everyone. The Tesseract's energy forms into a cloud that reaches to the top of the facility's vacuum chamber ceiling. It's abnormally quiet. Then… Heavy breathing is heard from the platform.

SHIELD guards slowly approach, weapons in hands. A figure is kneeling on the platform, smoke coming off it. It's Loki. Smiling in his mischievous manner, he raises his head. The smile dies down. He looks into the eyes of Fury, Barton and Selvig. He stands up, holding the scepter.

"Sir, please put down the spear!" Fury says in a commanding tone.

Loki looks at his spear then suddenly points it at Fury and Barton, and shoots out a blue light towards them. Barton tackles Fury and they both barely miss Loki's fired shot, it strikes the ground, exploding before them.

All hell breaks loose after that. Machine gun fire is shot at Loki, but the bullets bounce off of him like he's made of steel. He jumps high off the platform, attacking those firing at him. In the blink of an eye, Loki takes down several guards with his knives and energy blasts from the scepter. He stops and waits to see who will attack him next. Honestly, the whole lab has almost gone to shit.

Barton tries to stand up, slowly, Loki quickly walks towards him. Barton raises his gun, but Loki grabs his hand.

"You have heart."

Loki touches the tip of the spear to Barton's chest, blue light spreads up his neck to his face. His eyes turn solid black then turn a sickening shade of blue, the same color as the blue of Loki's scepter. The ability to control Barton's mind is now in Loki's hands. Barton puts his piece away and stands straight, looking to Loki for orders.

As Loki is busy using his abilities to turn another SHIELD Agent into his slave, Fury takes the Tesseract, placing it back into its case and tries to leave the lab quickly. Then…

"Please don't. I still need that."

Fury turns back to face him, "This doesn't have to get any messier."

"Of course it does. I've come too far for anything else. I am Loki of Asgard, and I am burdened with glorious purpose."

Behind Loki the Doctor has stood up, "Loki? Brother of Thor?"

"We have no quarrel with your people." Fury assures him.

"An ant has no quarrel with a boot."

"Are you planning to step on us?"

"I come with glad tidings, of a world made free."

"Free from what?"

"Freedom. Freedom is life's great lie. Once you accept that, in your heart…"

Like a gunslinger, Loki turns to face Selvig who's standing behind him. Placing his spear against Selvig's heart, his eyes turn black.

"You will know peace."

"Yeah, you say "peace," I kind of think you mean the other thing." Fury tells him, his hand on his firearm.

From the vacuum chamber ceiling, the Tesseract's energy cloud rapidly builds into what may be an implosion. Barton notices it and moves to stand by Loki's side.

"Sir, Director Fury is stalling. This place is about to blow and drop about a hundred feet of rock on us. He means to bury us."

"Like the Pharaoh's of old." Fury confirms.

Dr. Selvig looks to the monitors, "He's right. The portal is collapsing in on itself. We've got maybe two minutes before this place goes critical."

"Well, then…"

Loki looks to Barton, who doesn't even hesitate as he takes out his gun and shoots Fury in the chest, who falls to the ground. Barton grabs the case containing the Tesseract and leaves the lab with Loki, Selvig and the SHIELD Agent.

* * *

They get to the bunker, at the entrance of the exiting tunnel, they walk past Agent Hill, Barton points to the Humvees. "I need these vehicles."

"Who's that?" Hill says referring to Loki.

"He didn't tell me."

Agent Hill looks suspiciously at them as Loki gets in the back of the truck. As she turns and is walking away, her walkie talkie crackles to life.

"Hill? Do you copy!"

Loki and Barton look sharply at Agent Hill as they hear Fury's voice. Inside the lab he sits up, breathing heavily and pulls out the bullet. "Barton has turned."

* * *

Back in the bunker, Hill turns to shoot at Barton, but he has already drawn his and fires multiple shots at her. He moves to the driver's seat and drives off as Hill keeps shooting. Fury calls on her radio again, "They have the Tesseract! Shut them down!"

Agent Hill slips into a Jeep and follows after Barton's truck. Several SHIELD trucks and cars pull up to them, a drive-by shooting ensues. Loki who stands in the bed of the truck, uses his scepter and emits energy blasts, flipping over SHIELD trucks. Agent Hill puts herself back a distance.

* * *

Back inside, Fury races out of the hallway, avoiding falling pipes. The entire facility is now in a full earthquake.

* * *

Outside Agent Coulson and several SHIELD Agents fall down the steps, dropping silver cases of information. They attempt to grab them, but Agent Coulson shoves them forward, "Okay, let's go. No, no, no, Leave it. Go!"

* * *

Agent Hill's Jeep roars out from a cross tunnel in front of Barton's truck, he slams on the brakes. She pulls her brake, swerving into a 180, facing Barton's truck, driving in reverse. Barton's arm reaches out the open window and opens fire. Agent Hill figures 'fuck it' and shoots out her windshield opening fire on Barton.

* * *

Agent Coulson jumps into a SHIELD truck, he picks up his walkie-talkie, "We're clear upstairs, Sir. You need to go!"

* * *

Fury bolts out of the facility and jumps into a waiting helicopter. The surface of the pad gives way, plunging the helicopter through the surface, the chopper barely makes it out.

* * *

Still in a chase, Barton pushes the pedal harder, which causes Hill's Jeep to wobble and fall back behind Barton's truck.

* * *

The Tesseract's energy cloud now shrinks into a small ball of white light. Then…

A cloud of blue light consumes the entire facility and parts of the desert. Fury watches from below, a build-up into what may be an implosion.

* * *

Agent Coulson and several Agents watch as the road directly behind their truck begins to crack and fall, dissipating into the giant hole growing around the facility.

The blast wave of the Tesseract causes the tunnel to cave in. Like an ocean wave. Blinding crumbles of rock, fall onto Agent Hill's Jeep, leaving her nearly trapped under this blanket of rock.

Barton's truck escapes the tunnel and drives into the desert landscape. Fury's helicopter roars over Barton's truck. Loki looks up. From the chopper's door, it slides open and Fury stands there, holding a gun, he opens fire on the truck.

Loki looks at Fury and in a fit of rage he fires a bolt from his scepter, hitting the helicopter in the fantail. The chopper catches fire, going down in a fiery ball. Fury waits till the chopper is just about to hit the ground, jumps out rolling onto the desert, as the chopper barrels along the ground.

He quickly gets up, pulls his gun and fires at Loki, but they're too far away. Loki looks back, smiling. Fury stands there, mind reeling. Then…

"Director? Director Fury, do you copy?" Agent Coulson's voice crackles through his walkie talkie.

Fury sighs before he answers, "The Tesseract is with a hostile force. I have men down. Hill?"

Agent Hill climbs out of her Jeep, which is sandwiched in by rocks, but luckily, not her. "A lot of men still under. I don't know how many survivors."

"Sound a general call. I want every living soul not working rescue, looking for that briefcase."

"Roger that." Hill replies.

"Coulson, get back to base. This is a Level Seven. As of right now, we are at war."

There is a beat of silence before Agent Coulson replies to the Director. "What do we do?"

Fury stands there, thinking. He looks up. On his face is a sign of hope.


	3. Assemble: Black Widow & The Hulk

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

Russia, Solenski Plaza, 3rd floor. The same night, on the outskirts, near a railroad, inside a construction building. Gerogi Luchkov, a large, Russian General and his two thugs are standing before a red headed woman, barefoot, in a black dress, tied to a chair.

Natasha Romanoff, a slewing, foxy, unbelievably sexy spy.

The taller of the two thugs backhands Natasha's face. She feels the pain, but does not breakdown, simply rolling her head back and then around gazing at the men. Luchkov, smiling, walks up to her, he speaks in Russian.

"This is not how I wanted the evening to go."

Natasha replies in Russian, "I know how you wanted this evening to go. Believe me, this is better."

"Who are you working for? Lermentov, yes?"

The tall thug rocks her chair back, balancing her off the edge of an open floor. Natasha looks slightly afraid now. But only slightly.

"Does he think we have to go through him to move our cargo?"

"I thought General Solohob is in charge of the export business."

"Solohob, a bag man, a front. Your outdated information betrays you. The famous Black Widow, and she turns out to be simply another pretty face."

Natasha smirks, "You really think I'm pretty?"

The tall thug squeezes her mouth opening it, Luchkov slowly walks over to a table filled with tools. "Tell Lermentov, we do not need him to move the tanks. Tell him he is out. Well…" He picks up a pair of pliers, turning back to her, he speaks in English, "…You may have to write it down."

Suddenly, the other thug's cell phone rings, confused, he answers it. "Ya?" He looks at Luchkov, "It's for her."

Luchkov takes the phone, he's pissed. "You listen carefully…"

Agent Coulson is on the other end, "You're at 1-14 Silensky Plaza, 3rd floor. We have an F-22 exactly 8 miles out. Put the woman on the phone, or I will blow up the block before you can make the lobby."

Luchkov looks stunned as he walks over, placing the phone against Natasha's ear and backing away.

"We need you to come in." Agent Coulson tells her.

Natasha is flabbergasted, "Are you kidding? I'm working!"

"This takes precedence."

"I'm in the middle of an interrogation. This moron is giving me everything."

Luchkov gives him men a look, "I don't give everything." Natasha gives him a look. "Look, you can't pull me out of this right now."

"Natasha… Barton's been compromised."

A beat sounds, something flickers across Natasha's face. "Let me put you on hold."

She nods to Luchkov, who takes the phone from her. Natasha hits him in the leg and head butts him. Like a spider she stands up elegantly and starts attacking the tall thug by kickboxing him in the face. Still tied, she rolls over the smaller thug after she trips him. She then stomps on the tall thug's foot with the peg of the chair, then knocks him out with her head.

During all of this, Coulson is still waiting on the phone, he hears the fighting going on.

She then flips over and falls down hard on the smaller thug, breaking the chair. She sees the tall thug stand up. Giving her momentum, she runs at him drop kicking him. She falls to her back and then flips back up and wraps her legs around his neck and knocks him out cold.

She grabs Luchkov, wraps his leg around with a hanging chain and drops him down the open floor, dangling. She picks up the phone and her heels, sauntering towards the door.

"Where's Barton now?"

"We don't know."

"But he's alive?"

"We think so. I'll brief you on everything when you get back. But first, we need you to talk to the big guy."

Natasha smirks as she speaks. "Coulson, you know that Stark trusts me about as far as he can throw me."

"Oh, I've got Stark. You get the big guy."

Natasha stops, her breath catching, "Bozhe moi."

* * *

In an Indian slum, night, a little girl runs through the crowd, trying to force a way through. She runs up a flight of stairs into a room, only to be stopped by an attending woman. Then, the little girl notices him. Bruce Banner, their local Doctor. Their speaking in another language.

"Who are you?! Get out! There is sickness here!"

"You're a Doctor! My father's not waking up! He has a fever and he's moaning but his eyes won't open."

"Slow down."

"My father…"

Banner kneels down, he sees the little girl staring at the people, lying down, looking very sick. "Like them?"

The little girl holds all the money she has in the world, "Please."

Banner follows the little girl hastily, nearly to the edge of town. The little girl gets ahead of herself, Banner spots a local government car, he turns around holding the girl, blocking any view of his face. After it passes, he quickly follows her inside her house. As he walks in, the little girl escapes out a window. Banner is left standing there like a dumbass.

"You should've got paid up front, Banner."

"You know, for a man who's supposed to be avoiding stress, you picked a hell of a place to settle." Natasha appears from behind the curtains, Banner turns around quietly.

"Avoiding stress isn't the secret."

"Then, what is it? Yoga?"

"You brought me to the edge of the city. Smart. I uh… assume the whole place is surrounded."

"Just you and me."

"And your actress buddy? Is she a spy, too? They start that young?"

"I did."

"Who are you?"

"Natasha Romanoff."

"Are you here to kill me, Miss Romanoff? Because that's not gonna work out for everyone."

"No. No. Of course not. I'm here on behalf of SHIELD."

"SHIELD. How'd they find me?"

"We never lost you, Doctor. We've kept our distance. Even helped keep some other interested parties off your scent."

"Why?"

"Nick Fury seems to trust you. But now we need you to come in."

"What if I say no?"

"I'll persuade you."

"And what if the… other guy says no?"

"You've been more than a year without an incident. I don't think you wanna break that streak."

"Well, I don't every time get what I want."

"Doctor, we're facing a potential global catastrophe."

Banner chuckles, "Well, those I actively try to avoid."

She takes out her cell phone and slides it across the small table in between them, as she sits down. "This is the Tesseract. It has the potential energy to wipe out the planet."

He puts on his glasses, picks it up, taking a closer look. "What does Fury want me to do, swallow it?"

"He wants you to find it. It's been taken. It emits a gamma signature that's too weak for us to trace. There's no one that knows gamma radiation like you do. If there was, that's where I'd be."

"So, Fury isn't after the monster?"

"Not that he's told me."

"And he tells you everything?"

"Talk to Fury. He needs you on this."

"He needs me in a cage?"

"No one's going to put you in a…"

"STOP LYING TO ME!" He yells slamming his hands down on the table.

The thunderous tone in his voice coupled with the smacking of hands on the table, makes Natasha quickly grab her gun and point it at him, but something is now off in the atmosphere. Banner stands up straight, smiling.

"I'm sorry. That was mean. I just wanted to see what you'd do. Why don't we do this the easy way, where you don't use that, and the other guy doesn't make a mess? Okay? Natasha?"

Natasha, still wary, lowers her gun and speaks into her earpiece. "Stand down. We're good here."

Amazingly, dozens of SHIELD Agents are surrounding the shack outside, they lower their weapons as they hear Natasha's voice. Banner looks at Natasha, charming a smile at her.

"Just you and me?"

Natasha fidgets now that she is exposed her guard down.


	4. Assemble: Cap, Iron Man & Angel

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

Inside the SHIELD base, in the analytical room. Fury is facing several large monitors as he is in conference with members of the World Security Council.

"This is out of line, Director. You're dealing with forces you can't control."

"You ever been in a war, Councilman? In a firefight? Did you feel an overabundance of control?"

"You saying that this Asgard is declaring war on our planet?"

"Not Asgard. Loki."

"He can't be working alone. What about the other one? His brother."

"Our intelligence says, Thor is not a hostile. But he's worlds away. We can't depend on him to help, either. It's up to us."

"And what about the Fallen Angel? Is it possible she could be helping Loki?"

"No. I can vouch for her myself, she's with us."

"Which is why you should be focusing on Phase 2. It was designed for exactly this…"

"Phase 2 isn't ready. Our enemy is. We need a response team."

"The Avengers Initiative was shut down."

"This isn't about the Avengers."

"We've seen the list."

"You're running the world's greatest covert security network and you're gonna leave the fate of the human race to a handful of freaks."

"I'm not leaving anything to anyone. We need a response team. These people may be isolated, unbalanced even, but I believe with the right push they can be exactly what we need."

"You believe?"

"War isn't won by sentiment, Director."

"No, it's won by soldiers."

* * *

In Brooklyn, somewhere in an old, almost WWII-esque boxing gym, Steve Rogers, a man out of time, The First Avenger, Captain America, is pummeling a punching bag. With every swing, it's like a memory he's trying to fight off and repress.

_Captain America is running through the forest, dodging mortars, gunfire and the Tesseract's enemy firearms. "There's not enough time! I got to put her in the water!"_

Steve's rage keeps building as he punches the bag. It gets harder…

_On Red Skull's ship, Steve places his compass with an image of Peggy Carter. The time is here for him to crash the plane._

Steve closes his eyes and goes at the bag harder.

_"__You won't be alone." Peggy's voice says._

_The Red Skull picks the Tesseract._

Steve opens his eyes and tears the bag as the last memory kicks in. Not sure if he can physically stop…

_"__Oh my God!" A SHIELD scientist says._

_Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S, Antarctica, a half frozen Steve Rogers is lying on a medical slab. Two SHIELD scientists run over hi-tech devices to see if his vitals are up. And it seems…_

_"__This guy's still alive!"_

Steve tears the bag open, off its chain, spilling out the sand. He stands, breathing hard, letting out 70 years of repressed feelings. After taking a few breathers, Steve picks up another punching bag, which is laying next to another dozen bags. He hooks the bag up and starts punching again. Fury walks in, though Steve doesn't notice him.

"Trouble sleeping?"

Steve now looks up noticing the Director. "I slept for 70 years, Sir. I think I've had my fill."

"Then you should be out, celebrating, seeing the world."

Steve stops punching and walks over to the bench, unraveling the bands on his hands. He sits down. "When I went under, the world was at war. I wake up, they say we won. They didn't say what we lost."

"We've made some mistakes along the way. Some, very recently."

"You here with a mission, Sir?"

"I am."

"Trying to get me back in the world?"

"Trying to save it."

Fury hands Steve a file on Tesseract, along with other files of HYDRA'S projects.

"HYDRA's secret weapon."

"Howard Stark fished that out of the ocean when he was looking for you. He thought what we think. The Tesseract could be the key to unlimited sustainable energy. That's something the world sorely needs."

"Who took it from you?"

"He's called Loki. He's… not from around here. There's a lot we'll have to bring you up to speed on if you're in. The world has gotten even stranger than you already know."

"At this point, I doubt anything would surprise me."

"Ten bucks says you're wrong. There's a debriefing package waiting for you back at your apartment."

Steve turns, picking up a punching bag he hefts it onto his shoulder like it was a piece a paper, he then picks up his duffle bag and starts walking out of the gym.

"Is there anything you can tell us about the Tesseract that we ought to know now." Fury asks him.

"You should have left it in the ocean."

* * *

Out in the Atlantic Ocean, Tony Stark, in his Iron Man suit, is cutting a pipeline transport with a laser cutter coming from his hand. He then places a Stark Energy Reactor on the open pipe. It lights up. Iron Man rockets out of the water and flies towards Stark Tower.

"Good to go on this end. The rest is up to you."

On the other end of the line is Pepper Potts, Tony's better half. "You disconnected the transmission lines? Are we off the grid?"

Inside his suit, Pepper appears on his HUD monitor. "Stark tower is about to become a beacon of self-sustaining clean energy."

"Well, assuming the Arc reactor takes over and it actually works?"

"I assume. Light her up."

As Iron Man flies to the Stark Tower building, the power is switched on and the STARK sign lights up.

"How does it look?"

"Like Christmas, but with more… Me."

"We've gotta go wider on the public awareness campaign. You need to do some press. I'm in DC tomorrow. I'm working on the zoning for the next three buildings."

"Pepper, you're killing me. The moment, remember? Enjoy the moment."

"Then get in here and I will."

Tony arrives at his skyscraper penthouse and is in the process of taking off his Iron Man suit through a hi-tech gauntlet of gadgets.

Jarvis addresses him, "Sir, Agent Coulson of SHIELD is on the line."

"I'm not in. I'm actually out."

"Sir, I'm afraid he's insisting."

"Grow a spine, Jarvis. I got a date."

Tony walks into the penthouse, Pepper stares up at the monitors at the reactor device.

"Levels are holding steady… I think." Pepper tells him.

"Of course they are, I was directly involved. Which brings me to my next question: how does it feel to be a genius?"

"Well, ha, I really wouldn't know, now would I?"

"What do you mean? All this, came from you."

"No, all this came from that." She says pointing to the energy in his chest plate.

"Give yourself some credit. Please. Stark Tower is your baby. Give yourself… twelve percent of the credit."

"Twelve percent?" Pepper says giving him an incredulous look.

"An argument can be made for fifteen."

"Twelve percent? My baby?"

"Well, I did do all the heavy lifting. Literally, I lifted the heavy things. And, sorry, but the security snafu? That was on you."

"Oooooh."

"My private elevator…"

"You mean OUR elevator?"

"…it was teeming with sweaty workmen." He kneels down on the floor beside her. "I'm going to pay for that comment about percentages in some subtle way later, aren't I?"

Pepper pours herself and Tony a glass of champagne. She smirks, "Not gonna be that subtle."

"I'll tell you what. The next building is gonna say 'Potts' on the tower."

"On the lease."

"…Call your mom, can you bunk over?"

Jarvis interrupts, "Sir, the telephone. I'm afraid my protocols are being overridden."

"Mr. Stark, we need to talk." Agent Coulson's voice float over the phone line.

Tony picks up his phone and looks into it at Coulson. "You have reached the life model decoy of Tony Stark. Please leave a message."

"This is urgent."

"Then leave it urgently."

At that moment the elevator door opens and Coulson appears.

"Security break." Tony looks to Pepper, "That's on you."

"Mr. Stark."

"Phil! Come in." Pepper tells him standing up and walking over to greet him.

"I can't stay."

"Phil? Uh, his first name is "Agent."

"Come on in. We're celebrating."

"Which is why he can't stay."

"We need you to look this over." Coulson holds out a file towards Stark, "Soon as possible."

"I don't like being handed things."

"That's fine, cause I love to be handed things. So, let's trade."

She passes her glass of champagne to Coulson and takes the file from him, then takes Tony's glass and hands him the file.

"Thank you." She says sweetly.

"Official consulting hours are between eight and five every other Thursday."

"This isn't a consultation." Coulson tells him.

"Is this about the Avengers?" Pepper asks before looking sheepish, "Which I… I know nothing about."

Tony walks over to his bank of computers, "The Avengers initiative was scrapped, I thought. And I didn't even qualify."

"I didn't know that either." Pepper said.

"Yeah, apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, don't play well with others."

"That I did know." Pepper said smiling.

"This isn't about personality profiles anymore." Coulson tells him.

"Whatever. Miss Potts, got a second?"

Pepper walks over to Tony who places the files' into his own databases. He looks at her as she stands next to him, "You know, I thought we were having a moment."

"I was having twelve percent of a moment. This seems serious. Phil's pretty shaken."

"How would you know if it's… Why is he "Phil?"

"What is all this?" Pepper gestures to the monitors.

"This is, uh…" Tony expands his arms and different profiles appear in holographic form floating in the air in front of Tony and Pepper. "This."

Screens appear of Captain America in action, the Hulk roaring as he attacks the army at Culver University, Hawkeye and Black Widow exchanging gunfire in Budapest, Thor and Arabella fighting the destroyer in New Mexico and another is of Loki and the Tesseract, to which Stark and Pepper look on in awe.

"I'm going to take the jet to DC tonight." Pepper says staring at the screens.

"Tomorrow."

"You have homework. You have a lot of homework."

"Well, what if I didn't?"

"If you didn't?"

"Yeah."

"You mean when you've finished?" Tony nods his head. "Well, um… then…" Pepper whispers in his ear, earning a gasp from Tony, Coulson looks away in embarrassment.

Tony smirks, "Square deal. Fly safe."

Pepper kisses him. "Work hard."

As Pepper leaves with Agent Coulson, Tony grabs the Tesseract hologram, staring at it, worried.

* * *

Director Fury knocks on the door of the high rise penthouse, he didn't imagine her to be living in a place like this, it wasn't her style. Hearing no response, he simply let himself in.

Twenty minutes later the door opens to reveal the stunning red-head he had come here to recruit. She enters the living room, not at all surprised to see him sitting on her couch.

"I never did know you to warrant an invitation. I assume you are here about the Tesseract."

The Director cocks his head, "You had a vision."

"More like a nightmare." She moves to the couch sitting down. "Can I get you anything?"

"I'm fine. Thank you." He looks around the room, "How are you adjusting?"

A sadness flashes in her eyes for a moment, but only a moment. "Considering it has been only a year. I'm still… adjusting. So why don't you cut to the part where you tell me what you need Director."

"I need your help."

"I gathered. Why else would you be here?"

"The Tesseract has been stolen, I need a team to get it back."

"And you want me on this team," she asks, already knowing the answer. He nods. "Why?"

"Because you have first hand knowledge about the person who stole it." She gives him a raised eyebrow, waiting for him to continue. "His name is Loki."

He sees her eyes widen, tears forming in the deep blue pools. Her mind races, _'Loki is alive? How did he survive the fall?'_ It only takes her a split second to make her decision. "Alright, I'm in."

"Good." Fury stands heading for the door, he stops in the doorway glancing back at her, "I'll send a jet for you."

She smirks, "Thanks. But I've got my own wings."


	5. Assemble: Thor

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

The next day inside the Quinjet, Steve is sitting down holding a tablet, watching the footage of the Hulk's attack on the Army at Culver University.

"We're about forty minutes out from home base, Sir." The Pilot radios back to Agent Coulson, who stands up from his seat, walking over to Steve.

"So, this Doctor Banner was trying to replicate the serum they used on me?"

"A lot of people were. You were the world's first superhero. Banner thought gamma radiation might hold the key to unlocking Erskine's original formula."

The Hulk roars with fury as he slams a Jeep apart.

"Didn't really go his way, did it?"

"Not so much. When he's not that thing, though, the guy's like a Stephen Hawking."

Steve looks to him confused, Coulson sighs, "He's like a smart person. I gotta say, it's an honor to meet you, officially."

Steve smiles at Coulson, who speaks nervously. "I sort of met you, I mean, I watched you while you were sleeping."

Steve looks down. He stands up, closes his laptop and walks to the side with Coulson following.

"I mean, I was… I was present while you were unconscious from the ice. You know, it's really, it's just a… just a huge honor to have you on board this..."

"I hope I'm the man for the job."

"Oh, you are. Absolutely. Uh… we've made some modifications to the uniform. I had a little design input."

"The uniform? Aren't the stars and stripes a little… old-fashioned?"

"With everything that's happening, the things that are about to come to light, people might just need a little old-fashioned."

Steve takes in Coulson's statement.

* * *

Elsewhere in an underground lab, several soldiers under Loki's mind control run around, preparing to infiltrate whatever Loki has planned. Loki sits down, watching Selvig work with a CMS device. Loki meditates, until… the scepter materializes him back into the throne room of The Other.

The Other appears from the steps speaking to Loki. "The Chitauri grow restless."

"Let them gird themselves. I will lead them in the glorious battle."

"Battle? Against the meager might of Earth?"

Loki is now adorned in his battle armor, complete with his gold horned helmet. "Glorious, not lengthy. If your force is as formidable as you claim."

"You question us? You question HIM? He, who put the scepter in your hand? Who gave you ancient knowledge and new purpose when you were cast out, defeated?"

"I was a King! The rightful King of Asgard! Betrayed!"

"Your ambition is little, born of childish need. We look beyond the Earth to greater worlds the Tesseract will unveil."

"You don't have the Tesseract yet."

The Other runs over to attack him, but stops as Loki points his scepter. "I don't threaten. But until I open the doors, until your force is mine to command, you are but words."

"You will have your war, Asgardian. If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice where he cannot find you. You think you know pain? He will make you long for something sweet as pain."

The Other places his hand on Loki's head and transports him back to Earth, Loki looks around, menacing.

* * *

The Quinjet lands down on a massive battleship known as the Helicarrier. It has two runways. One with direct access to a hanger at the rear is aligned along the spine of the vessel.

Agent Coulson and Steve walk down the ramp, meeting up with Natasha.

"Agent Romanoff. Captain Rodgers."

"Ma'am."

"Hi." She turns to Coulson. "They need you on the bridge. They're starting the face trace."

"See you there."

Agent Coulson walks away leaving Steve with Natasha, walking towards the railing of the ship.

"It was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice. I thought Coulson was gonna swoon. Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards yet?"

"Trading cards?"

"They're vintage. He's very proud."

Without realizing, Banner doesn't notice them walking as he is nervous as hell. He moves around as people keep walking in his way.

"Dr. Banner." Steve walks up to him, shaking his hand.

"Oh, yeah. Hi. They told me you'd be coming." Banner says looking around cautiously.

"Word is, you can find the cube."

"Is that the only word on me?"

"Only word I care about."

Banner takes in the sentiment, "Must be strange for you, all of this."

"Well, this is actually kind of familiar."

"Gentlemen." Natasha approaches them. "You may want to step inside in a minute. It's gonna get a little hard to breath."

Suddenly the Helicarrier starts shaking, Steve looks to the young woman, "Is this a submarine?"

"Really?" Banner looks to her. "They want me in a submerged pressurized metal container?"

They both move closer to the edge of the Helicarrier. Four huge lift fans mounted on the sides, they start to lift into the air. Steve watches in awe, Banner smiles, "No, no. This is much worse."

The two men follow Natasha inside, the doors part, the bridge of the ship is a flurry of activity. Dozens of Agents sit in front of their view screens. Agent Hill shouts her instructions to leave, she turns to Nick Fury, who is at the command console.

"We're at level, Sir."

"Good. Let's vanish."

As the Helicarrier rises high into the heavens, the entire ship is covered in reflecting mirrors, which then camouflages in the sky.

Steve and Banner walk through the glorious, gleaming bridge. Fury turns to them, "Gentlemen."

Steve gives Fury ten bucks, referring to an earlier statement about never being surprised again. Fury walks over to Banner and extends his hand, Banner, reluctantly shakes it.

"Doctor, thank you for coming."

"Thanks for asking nicely. So, uh… how long am I staying?"

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the wind."

"Where are you with that?"

Fury turns to Agent Coulson to explain, while Natasha eyes an image of Barton on a computer screen.

"We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops... If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

Natasha joins the conversation, "That's still not gonna find them in time."

"You have to narrow your field. How many spectrometers do you have access to?" Banner asks.

"How many are there?" Fury wonders.

"Call every lab you know Tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm, basic cluster recognition. At least we could rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

"Agent Romanoff, would you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please."

Natasha nods and leads Banner down the hall, "You're gonna love it, Doc. We got all the toys."

* * *

Back in the underground lab, Selvig and several scientists work around the CMS device. "Put it over there!"

Barton walks in holding a tablet, Selvig turns to him, "Where did you find all these people?"

"SHIELD has no shortage of enemies, Doctor." He holds up the screen showing information on Iridium. "Is this the stuff you need?"

"Yeah, iridium. It's found in meteorites, it forms anti-protons. It's very hard to get hold of."

"Especially if SHIELD knows you need it."

"Well, I didn't know!" Selvig sees Loki coming, "Hey! The Tesseract is showing me so much. It's more than knowledge. It's… truth."

"I know." Loki turns to Barton, "What did it show you, Agent Barton?"

"My next target."

"Tell me what you need."

"I need a distraction." He grabs his bow, "And an eyeball."

* * *

As they are waiting to locate Loki using satellite facial recognition, Coulson and Steve stand side by side, waiting.

"I mean, if it's not too much trouble."

"No, no. It's fine."

"It's a vintage set. It took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint. Slight foxing around the edges, but…"

Coulson is interrupted by Agent Jasper Sitwell, "We got a hit. Sixty-seven percent match. Wait. Cross match, seventy-nine percent."

"Location?" Coulson asks.

"Stuttgart, Germany. 28, Konigstrasse. He's not exactly hiding."

Fury looks to Steve, "Captain, you're up."

Steve nods, then leaves.

* * *

Loki standing in front of the museum, dressed in 21st century attire and with the scepter, disguised as a cane, walks up to the entrance of the building. Inside, a lavish gala with an orchestra playing, is interrupted as the head Doctor walks up to the mic.

* * *

Inside the Helicarrier Steve walks into his own locker room. As he approaches the steel cabinet, the doors already open to reveal the updated Captain American uniform, complete with the famous Shield. He stands in silence.

* * *

Outside of the laboratory, guards stand in their positions. One of them is standing on top of the roof, scoping. He then hears a thwack! He looks down, one of his guards is shot by an arrow. He raises his gun, only to be shot dead by an arrow, he falls from the building.

* * *

Barton and his crew arrive at the doors of the locked science building. Barton looks at the retinal scanner, he pulls out a SHIELD eye scanner instrument.

* * *

Loki looks down from the balcony, descending the stairs down to where the head Doctor is. As he makes his way down and near the stage, he flips his cane to the other end. The guard there notices him, pulls out his gun, but Loki swings the clubs up slamming the end into his jaw. Chaos erupts.

Guests begin to leave the museum, Loki grabs the Doctor and heaves him onto a marble table of the mythological creatures Bilchsteim. Flipping him around so his head is next to Loki, he pulls out an optical torture device. He plunges the device down into the Doctor's eye, as he twists and struggles in pain. Loki smirks as people run for the doors screaming in fear.

* * *

Suddenly, from Barton's instrument, a holographic eye of the Doctor appears and the image of the Doctor appears on screen. The doors to the facility open. Barton walks in, finding what he seeks in a cabinet. A glass thermos with a cylinder of iridium.

* * *

As the crowd runs away, Loki slowly walks out and materializes into his gold armor and horned helmet. The Police arrive and with no hesitation, he blasts the cars, flipping them over and over.

"Kneel before me."

The crowd ignores him. Another Loki appears, blocking the crowd. Loki after Loki appear, they all grin as they raise their spears, encircling the crowd.

"I said. Kneel!"

Everyone becomes quiet and kneels in front of him, Loki embracing, his arms out, smiling.

"Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel."

As the words resonate to the kneeling crowd, and elder German man refuses to kneel and stands, heroic. "Not to men like you."

"There are no men like me."

"There are always men like you."

"Look to your elder, people. Let him be an example."

Loki is about to execute him with his scepter as the light glows blue. Just as the energy beam shoots out, Captain America arrives. He dives in just in time and blocks the blast with his shield, sending it back at Loki, knocking the God on his ass.

"You know, the last time I was in Germany and saw a man standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing."

Loki stands up, "The soldier." Loki laughs, "The man out of time."

"I'm not the one who's out of time."

From above Cap, the Quinjet arrives, shining lights and a rather impressive machine gun is pointed towards Loki. Natasha sits in the co-pilots seat, "Loki, drop the weapon and stand down."

Suddenly Loki volleys a ball of energy at the aircraft. Natasha maneuvers it just in time, giving Cap the time to throw his shield at Loki. They both begin to tussle.

Loki flings Cap to the ground. Cap then throws his shield, but Loki swats it away. Cap, even using all the moves of a boxer, is knocked down by Loki forcing the spangled man to his knee.

"Kneel." He demanded placing the butt of the staff on the Captain's head.

"Not today!" Cap flips and knocks him out with his leg. Loki grabs him and flips him over.

"This guy's all over the place." Natasha says. Suddenly AC/DC's "Shoot to Thrill" overdrives the Quinjet's speakers.

"Agent Romanoff. You miss me?"

Both Cap and Loki look up at the sky, something flies towards the brawl. It is Iron Man. Tony flies over and blasts Loki right back to the ground. Iron Man touches down, he stands up and pulls out every piece of weaponry the suit has aiming them at Loki.

"Make your move, Reindeer Games."

Loki puts up his hands and surrenders, his armor materializes away, the scepter sitting beside him on the ground.

"Good move." He puts his weapons away and waits for the jet to land.

Steve stands up, looking to Tony. "Mr. Stark."

"Captain."

* * *

Together they get Loki aboard, hand-cuffed, in a seat near the back. Natasha watches the skies as they fly back to base. Thunder and lightning suddenly coming out of nowhere. Fury speaks over her headset.

"Is he saying anything?"

"Not a word."

"Just get him here. We're low on time."

With Loki tied up and cuffed to his seat, Tony and Steve watch from a distance, talking low.

"I don't like it." Steve says.

"What? Rock of Ages giving up so easily?"

"I don't remember it being that easy. This guy packs a wallop."

"Still, you are pretty spry, for an older fellow. What's your thing? Pilates?"

"What?"

"It's like calisthenics. You might have missed a couple things, you know, doing time as a Capsicle."

Steve looks at Tony, meeting his ego match. "Fury didn't tell me he was calling you in."

"Yeah, there's a lot of things Fury doesn't tell you."

Thunder and lightning nearly hit the jet, making it shake violently.

"Where's this coming from?" Natasha wonders out loud as she looks to the skies.

Thunder rumbles overhead, Loki stares out the window anxiously, shrinking slightly as the lightning strikes.

"What's the matter? Scared of a little lightning?" Steve asks Loki.

"I'm not overly fond of what follows." Loki replies without any attitude, eyeing the windows of the jet, he knows what's coming.

The two superheroes look to one another, what did that mean?

Suddenly, a blinding light hits the jet, shaking it. Not a light. A God. The Mighty Thor. Tony puts the Iron Man helmet on. He opens the ramp and steps to the open hatch.

Cap eyes him, "What are you doing?"

Thor lands on the open ramp, the look on Loki's face is, 'oh shit!' Thor slams Tony back with his hammer, knocking him onto his back. He then breaks the cuffs binding his brother's wrists, grabs Loki by the throat, and flies out. Steve and Tony are left dumbstruck.

Tony climbs to his feet, less than happy. "And now there's that guy."

"Another Asgardian?" Natasha asks.

"That guy's a friendly?" Steve questions Tony.

"Doesn't matter." Stark replies. "If he frees Loki or kills him, the Tesseract's lost."

Tony turns and gets ready to jump off the jet to chase after Thor, Steve stops him. "Stark, we need a plan of attack!"

"I have a plan. Attack."

Iron Man jumps out of the jet and chases after Thor.

Frustrated Cap grabs a parachute to follow, Natasha looks back to him. "I'd sit this one out, Cap."

Still suiting up he relies, "I don't see how I can."

"These guys come from legend. They're basically Gods."

"There's only one God, ma'am." He grabs his shield and heads for the rear hatch. "And I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that." Caps turns and jumps out of the jet.

* * *

Somewhere out in the European mountains, Thor slams Loki down on top of a ledge high above the ground. Loki groans, then laughs. Thor looks down at his brother, who he thought to be dead and is angry to see him alive in this fashion.

"Where is the Tesseract?"

Loki laughs still lying on the ground, "I missed you too."

"Do I look to be in a gaming mood?!" Thor bellows.

Loki slowly raises to his feet as he speaks. "Oh, you should thank me. With the Bifrost gone, how much dark energy did the Allfather have to muster to conjure you here? Your precious Earth?"

Thor drops Mjolnir, causing the mountains to quake, as he picks up Loki, his brother, grabbing him with a hand behind the neck. Although Thor is distressed for what he has done, a family is everything to a man or God.

"I thought you dead."

"Did you mourn?"

"We all did. Our father…"

Loki holds up his finger, "Your father." He tosses Thor's hands off of him. "He did tell you my true parentage, did he not?"

Thor lets go of Loki, who walks away to the bottom of the ledge holding his lower back, causing an even bigger wedge between them.

"We were raised together. We played together, we fought together. Do you remember none of that?"

Loki turns around, "I remember a shadow. Living in the shade of your greatness. I remember you tossing me into an abyss. I, who was and should be King!"

"So you take the world I love as a recompense for your imagined slights? No. The Earth is under my protection, Loki."

Loki laughs, "And you're doing a marvelous job with that. The humans slaughter each other in droves, while you idly fret. I mean to rule them, and why should I not?"

"You think yourself above them?"

"Well, yes."

"Then you miss the truth of ruling, brother. A throne would suit you ill."

Angrily, Loki shoves his brother to the side, walking back up to the ledge, he turns around. "I've seen worlds you've never known about! I have grown, Odinson, in my exile! I have seen the true power of the Tesseract, and when I wield it…"

"Who showed you this power? Who controls the would-be-King?"

"I am a King!"

"Not here! You give up the Tesseract! You give up this poisonous dream!" Thor again places his hand on Loki's neck. "You come home."

Loki smiles, "I don't have it."

Thor steps back summoning Mjolnir to his hand, he holds it up ready to strike Loki.

"You need the cube to bring me home. But I've sent it off, I know not where."

Thor holds the hammer in front of him pointing it at Loki, "You listen well, brother. I…"

Thor is interrupted mid-sentence, knocked off the mountain by Iron Man who tackles him in mid-flight.

Loki looks around, "I'm listening."

* * *

Thor and Iron Man crash into the forest far below the cliff. Thor rolls himself up. Iron Man is still standing, but keeps his distance. The helmet opens up.

"Do not touch me again!"

"Then don't take my stuff."

"You have no idea what you're dealing with."

"Uh… Shakespeare in the park? Doth Mother know you wear-eth her drapes?"

"This is beyond you, metal man. Loki will face Asgardian justice!"

"He gives up the Cube, he's all yours. Until then…" Tony shuts his helmet. "Stay out of the way… Tourist."

Tony turns to walk away and in one quick motion, Thor pulls Mjolnir, throws it, and knocks Iron Man clear across into a tree.

Tony shakes himself, as he stands up, "Okay."

From the mountain side, Loki watches in amusement. Thor raises his hand, Mjolnir flies back to him. Thor swings the hammer, summoning a ray of energy. Iron Man stands back up, from his hand boosters, a blast of energy knocks Thor down. Iron Man flies back up and knocks Thor into a tree.

Thor, kneeling on the ground, pulls Mjolnir to his hand, raises it to the skies, pulling in lightning and thunder. Thor points the hammer at Iron Man, hitting him directly in the chest, the outpouring of bolts of lightning increases in intensity.

"Power at 400% capacity." Jarvis informs Tony.

"How bout that?" Tony says smirking.

Iron Man fires away from his hand boosters, pushing Thor to his knees. Like two gunslingers ready to draw, both Thor and Iron Man fly towards each other meet in the middle and ascend up. The two battle. Iron Man grasps Thor, elbowing him and smashing him into the side of a mountain. Thor leaps off the mountain and takes Iron Man with him.

The two crash right back down, smashing every tree possible. Iron Man yanks Thor right up. Thro grabs both hand boosters and begins to crush them. Tony quickly charges as much energy as he can and shoots it in Thor's face. Thor falls back, losing his stance. Iron Man head butts Thor with his gold-titanium alloy helmet, it barely phases Thor.

Thor then head butts Iron Man with his head and sends him across the forest. Iron Man boosters up and flies back at Thor, grabbing him by the arm and cape and swings him into another tree. Thor looks up, ready. Thor runs with all his patience out the window. Iron Man swings and misses, giving Thor the momentum to grab him, lift him and smashes him down hard.

Thor summons Mjolnir to his hand. Just as he's about to put the hammer down, Iron Man uses his hand boosters to skid across the ground and trip Thor over. Standing up, Thor looks for him, but from behind him, Iron Man crashes into his back. Thor stands facing Iron Man. Ready to pounce…

Captain America's shield ricochets off both Thor and Iron Man, stopping them. They look up to find Cap standing on top of a fallen tree with the shield back in his hand.

"Hey! That's enough!" Cap jumps down, looking at Thor. "Now, I don't know what you plan on doing here."

"I've come here to put an end to Loki's schemes!"

"Then prove it! Put that hammer down."

Tony steps up, "Um, yeah… No! Bad call! He loves his hammer!"

Thor backhands Iron Man like a pimp with Mjolnir. Losing all tolerance with this sentential of liberty, Thor raises the hammer.

"You want me to put the hammer down?"

Thor leaps high into the air, raising the hammer. Cap crouches down and holds up his shield. Thor brings the hammer down onto the shield and a massive implosion of light reacts to the vibranium shield creating a massive shockwave that blows up anything standing within a mile.

Iron Man stands up, looking around like 'holy shit.' Lying right next to him is Cap, who never takes his eyes off of Thor. Thor looks at both men.

"Are we done, here?" Cap asks.


	6. Old Friends

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

On the deck of the Helicarrier, the transport with Loki has just arrived. The band of heroes are walking ahead of the guards surrounding Loki. Just as they enter the airlock chamber, a commotion breaks out behind them.

Loki has managed to break loose from his bonds, he takes out the dozen guards easily and then steps to the edge of the Helicarrier. With a smirk at his brother and the other heroes, he lets himself fall backwards. The entire flight deck runs towards the edge, but before they get more than a few steps, a flurry of air hits them. They watch stunned as Loki is lifted above them surrounded by a cyclone of air, and within seconds is slammed to the deck with a force that makes the ground shake.

No one moves, still trying to process how Loki went from plummeting 30,000 feet to the ground, to lying on the deck gasping for air. However they receive their answer, as a beautiful red-head shoots from below the carrier, into the air above them and slams down, her boot pinning Loki's neck to the deck. The God stares up at the woman a look of embarrassment on his face, but he quickly replaces it with a look of defiance. As the wind dies down she glares at Loki, unshed tears in her eyes, her voice wavering, an unspoken rift between them. "Try that again and no amount of pain will compare to what I will do to you, Loki."

She kicks Loki over onto his stomach, drops a few seeds onto the deck next to him, and waves her hand over them. The seeds become vines, wrapping tightly around Loki's wrists. She turns to the SHIELD guards, "He's all yours."

She steps back as they pick Loki up and escort him inside. Fury walks over to her side, smiling, "Nice timing." He turns to the other Avengers, "Gentlemen, meet Arabella, the Fallen Angel."

* * *

Inside the Helicarrier dozens of SHIELD Police escort Loki, who is still bound, smiling. As they pass the lab, Banner stops working on the Chitauri scepter and looks up. Loki eyes him as he walks, nodding and smiling. Banner rubs his head.

In the Briefing Room the Avengers are getting acquainted. Arabella walks in nodding her head at the tall, blonde God, "Hello Thor." The God smiles back taking her into his muscle bound arms and hugging her tightly. "Hello, Bella."

The woman is released, she then turns to the other red-head, smiling. "Natasha."

"Arabella." She smiles back. "It's so good to see you again."

"As it is you." Arabella tells her, she glances around curiously before looking back to the SHIELD Agent, "Where's Hawkeye?"

Natasha says nothing, just looks to the floor. Arabella takes that as a very bad sign. She turns to Cap, holding out her hand, "You must be the famous Captain America. I am Arabella."

He takes her hand, smiling, "Steve. Pleasure, ma'am."

"Uh, I'm Dr. Banner." He says stuttering slightly, "Impressive the way you handled Loki."

A sadness passes over her face as she shakes his hand, "Thank you Doctor."

"Uh, can I ask, what skills you possess to help us. I mean, how did you do that with Loki?" Banner asks, looking at her curiously, hoping he didn't offend her.

"Of course, I believe it's only fair since I know everything about you all. To answer your question about what skills I possess, you need to know what I am." She looks longingly at the sky, "Or was."

"Which is?" Steve asks.

"An Angel."

Steve and Banner look at her skeptically, before Banner shakes his head, "Wait. You're telling us, that you're an Angel. Like from heaven. With God."

"You call him God. I call him father." She sees their disbelieving looks. "You do not believe me. That's good. You are not supposed too. If everyone actually believed in us, it would make it harder to be us." She backed away from the table making sure she had enough room. "I suppose a demonstration is in order."

She rolls her shoulders, feeling her wings break free from her skin. The awestruck looks on their faces made her smile, as she stretched her wings to their full 12 foot wingspan.

Dr. Banner stepped forward, reaching his hand it hesitantly, "May I?"

Arabella nodded, it was a common question from people she allowed to see her like this, they always wanted to know what they felt like.

Banner touched his fingertips to her right wing, the feathers were soft as silk. He stroked them once with his hand before he pulled back, a smile on his face.

"Do all Angels have black wings?" He asks.

Arabella shakes her head, "No. Only his Army and children have black wings. Humans who die receive white wings."

Steve steps forward, "So how did you end up on Earth?"

Arabella closes her eyes, her wings folding up against her back. "I was his only daughter. His advisor of sorts. Along with my four brothers; Raphael, Uriel, Gabriel and Michael."

"The four Archangels?" Steve asks, his eyes wide.

"Yes. Michael was the General of our father's Army, he and I were father's favorites." Arabella sighed, tears rimming her eyes. "7 years ago, God lost faith in mankind. He sent Michael to Earth, his mission was to kill a woman, carrying a baby, a boy. That boy was the key to mankind's survival. Michael did not believe that all of mankind needed to be wiped out, he believed that things could get better. He cut off his wings, gave up his position as General, cast himself out of heaven.

I was closer to Michael than any of my brothers, so I stood by his side. Our father said that since I cared so much about the mortals, that I should die with them. My wings were then cut, and I was cast out of heaven. I helped Michael save the human race. Our father realized that Michael was right all along. We were accepted back, Michael's rank and wings were restored.

I however wasn't as fortunate as Michael to simply fall back into routine. I was restless, and father could see it. I had spent a week living among the mortals, and I came to realize that there was so much I wanted to see, to experience.

So after several weeks of not being myself, father decided it was time for me to go. He made me what he calls the Guardian of the Mortals, I was put in charge of protecting all of humanity. To help me blend in he made me so I could hide my wings if necessary. He also gave me a gift, to help me protect the Earth. I have control of the four elements. As you saw on the deck, I can control the wind and earth, as well as fire and water."

She looked around as the two men digested her story. "Any other questions?"

"Why are the bottom of your wings red?" Steve asks cautiously.

"To remind me of the lives I've failed to save."

No more questions are asked after that, nor does anyone speak.

* * *

Loki is lead into the Detention section, he is now free from his cuffs and is contained in a large glass cell held by hydraulic rigs. Fury walks up to the control panel of the cell.

"In case it's unclear. You try to escape. You so much as scratch that glass."

He hits a button on the console in front of him, which opens up a hatch underneath Loki's cell. Loki peers down, as much as he can from the glass. Without seeing, the sounds of gusting wind would make a man terrified. Not a God, though.

"Thirty thousand feet, straight down in a steel trap. You get how that works?!"

Fury closes the hatch, and points at Loki. "Ant." Then he points at the button that would release the steel trap, "Boot."

Loki smirks, "It's an impressive cage. Not built, I think, for me."

"Built for something a lot stronger than you."

"Oh, I've heard." Loki says looking up into the camera aimed at his cell.

The others watch on the monitor, Loki being interrogated. Banner looks at the monitor, intently.

"A mindless beast. Makes play he's still a man. How desperate are you, that you call on such lost creatures to defend you?"

"How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. You talk about peace, and you kill cause it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did."

"Ooh. It burns you to have come so close. To have the Tesseract, to have power, unlimited power. And for what? A warm light for all mankind to share. And then to be reminded what real power is."

Fury smiles as he walks towards the door, "Well, let me know if _Real Power_ wants a magazine or something."

"Define something." Loki smirks stepping towards the side of the cell.

Fury stops midstride, he hadn't expected Loki to request anything. "Anything to keep you from misbehaving on my ship."

Loki smirked, he was hoping Fury would say something like that. He leans against the glass, "Arabella."

"No," Fury relied quickly, "I need you alive, and right now I don't think Arabella could spend five minutes with you before slitting your throat."

Fury walks off leaving Loki in his glass cell. Loki looks back at the camera, smiling.

* * *

They stand quietly, watching Loki until the monitor goes black. Thor, who didn't even look during Loki's interrogation, just listened, stands there, torn apart. They all just stand there, in stunned silence. Finally—

"He really grows on you doesn't he?" Banner says.

Fury walks in to the room where the Avengers are assembled, some sitting down but several standing. He leans down placing his hands on the table top, he glances to Arabella, "What do you think?"

She eyes Thor who nods to her, "He's hiding something."

"Do you two know each other?" Steve asks motioning between Arabella and Thor.

Thor comes too, he glances to Arabella before speaking, "We have— history. The three of us."

The group glances around understanding now why Arabella is here, she knows the two Gods personally. Steve nods, "Loki's gonna drag this out. So, Thor, what's his play?"

"He has an army called the Chitauri. They're not of Asgard or any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth, in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract."

Steve raises his eyebrow, "An army? From outer space?"

"So, he's building another portal. That's what he needs Erik Selvig for." Banner says catching on.

"Selvig?" Arabella hears the tone of Thor's voice, she being the only one who knows why.

Banner nods, "He's an astrophysicist."

"He's a friend." Thor tells them.

"Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours." Natasha confesses, sharing a worried look with Arabella.

"I want to know why Loki let us take him. He's not leading an army from here." Steve wonders out loud.

"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You could smell crazy on him."

Arabella steps quickly between Banner and Thor, her hand on the God's chest, as he stares down the Doctor. "Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard. And he's my brother."

"He killed eighty people in two days." Natasha tells Thor.

Thor shrugs, admitting, "He's adopted."

Arabella and Thor share a small smile before she backs up from him, standing at his side.

Banner meanwhile is thinking out loud, "I think it's about the mechanics. Iridium… What do they need the Iridium for?"

"It's a stabilizing agent." Arabella rolls her eyes at the new voice, of course they'd call him in. She hears him talking to Agent Coulson, "I'm just saying, take a weekend. I'll fly you to Portland. Keep love alive." He then turns back to the rest of the group. "It means the portal won't collapse on itself, like it did at SHIELD."

Tony stops next to Thor, "No hard feelings, Point Break. You've got a mean swing." He pats Thor on the arm before winking at Arabella. "Also, it means the portal can open as wide, and stay open as long, as Loki wants."

He steps up to Fury's control panel, "Uh, raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails. That man is playing Galaga! Thought we wouldn't notice. But we did." He looks to the two separate control panels one on each side of him, he covers one eye, looking side to side. "How does Fury even see these?"

Agent Hill stands behind him, "He turns."

"Sounds exhausting." Tony does some work on each of the monitors. "The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily. The only major component he still needs is a power source of high-energy density." Tony looks around the monitors and places a button size hacking implant on the side of Fury's computers, without anyone noticing. Except for Arabella, who watches him carefully, she knows Tony is always up to something. "Something to kick-start the Cube."

"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?" Agent Hill asks.

"Last night. The packet, Selvig's notes, the extraction theory papers. Am I the only one who did the reading?"

"Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?" Steve asks.

"He'd have to heat the Cube to a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier." Banner tells them.

"Unless, Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect." Tony says.

"Well, if he could do that he could achieve heavy ion fusion at any reactor on the planet."

"Finally, someone who speaks English." Tony says smiling.

Steve says glancing at Arabella, "Is that what just happened?" She smiles at him, as Tony and Banner shake hands. A glimmer in their eyes shines as the mutual respect for each other shows.

"It's good to meet you, Dr. Banner. You're work on antielectron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage-monster."

Banner casts his eyes to the floor, "Thanks."

Fury walks in addressing Stark, "Dr. Banner is only here to track the cube. I was hoping you might join him."

"I would start with that stick of his. It may be magical, but it works an awful lot like a HYDRA weapon." Steve offers.

Fury nods his head, "I don't know about that, but it is powered by the Cube. And I'd like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys."

"Monkeys? I do not understand." Thor says confused.

"I do!" Cap yells out, causing everyone to look at him. "I understood that reference."

Tony rolls his eyes, while Cap looks proud of himself. Tony looks to Banner, "Shall we play, doctor?"

"Let's play some."

As Banner and Stark walk out, the Galaga player turns ever so discreetly, watches as everyone else disperses and goes back to playing.

* * *

Inside Banner's lab, he continuously scans with a gamma ray detection scanner on the scepter for radiation. Tony looks at his monitors, shifting and solving as many algorithms and equations as he can.

"The gamma readings are definitely consistent with Selvig's reports of the Tesseract. But it's gonna take weeks to process." Banner tells Stark.

"If we bypass their mainframe and direct route to the Homer cluster, we can clock this at around six hundred teraflops."

"All I packed was a toothbrush."

Tony smiles, "You know, you should come by STARK TOWER sometime. Top ten floors, all R&D. You'd love it. It's candy land."

"Thanks, but the last time I was in New York, I kind of broke… Harlem."

"Well, I promise a stress-free environment. No tension, no surprises."

Suddenly, Tony pokes Banner with a miniature electrical prod. Steve walks in on them at that exact moment, pissed at Tony.

"Ow!" Banner yells clutching himself.

Tony looks at Banner closely, "Nothing?"

"Hey!" Steve looks to Tony, "Are you nuts?"

"Oh, please let me answer that," Arabella says walking in behind Steve, rolling her eyes as Tony winks at her saying, "Jury's out. You really have got a lid on it, haven't you? What's your secret? Mellow jazz, bongo drums, huge bag of weed?"

"Is everything a joke to you?" Steve asks eyeing Tony.

"Funny things are."

"Grow up Tony." Arabella says earning a cocky smirk from the playboy.

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny. No offense, Doc." Cap tells him.

"No, it's alright. I wouldn't have come aboard if I couldn't handle pointy things."

"You're tip-toeing, big man. You need to strut." Tony says cockily to Banner.

"And you need to focus on the problem, Mr. Stark." Cap tells him sternly.

Tony locks stares with Cap, "You think I'm not? Why did Fury call us in? Why now? Why not before? What isn't he telling us? I can't do the equation unless I have all the variables."

"You think Fury's hiding something?" Arabella states.

"He's a spy. Captain, he's "the" spy. His secrets have secrets." Tony points to Banner, "It's bugging him too, isn't it?"

Banner stutters, bobbling his words. "Uh… I just wanna finish my work here and…"

"Doctor?" Arabella asks, noticing his attention is diverted.

"A warm light for all mankind. Loki's jab at Fury about the cube."

"I heard it." Cap says.

Banner points at Tony, "Well, I think that was meant for you. Even if Barton didn't tell Loki about the tower, it was still all over the news."

"The Stark Tower? That big, ugly—" Tony gives Cap a look, "—building in New York?"

Banner nods, "It's powered by an arc reactor, a self-sustaining energy source. That building will run itself for, what, a year?"

"It's just the prototype. I'm kind of the only name in clean energy right now. That's what he's getting at."

"So, why didn't SHIELD bring him in on the Tesseract project?" Banner says referring to Tony. "I mean, what are they doing in the energy business in the first place?"

Tony nods agreeing, "I should probably look into that once my decryption programmer finishes breaking into all of SHIELD's secure files."

Cap looks taken by Tony's comment, "I'm sorry, did you say…?"

"I knew you were up to something on the bridge Stark." Arabella tells him.

He smiles back at her, "Jarvis has been running it since I hit the bridge. In a few hours we'll know every dirty secret SHIELD has ever tried to hide." He holds out a bag of blueberries, "Blueberry?"

"Yet you're confused about why they didn't want you around?" Cap asks him.

"An intelligence organization that fears intelligence? Historically, not awesome."

"I think Loki's trying to wind us up. This is a man who means to start a war, and if we don't stay focused, he'll succeed. We have orders. We should follow them." Cap tells them all.

"Following's not really my style."

Steve smiles, "And you're all about style, aren't you?"

A nerve is struck in Tony, "Of the people in this room, which one is; A, wearing a spangly outfit, and, B, not of use?"

Banner turns to Cap, "Steve, tell me none of this smells a little funky to you?"

Steve takes in the possibility, but as an obedient soldier, shakes it off. "Just find the Cube."

Steve smiles at Arabella before he walks out of the lab. Still torn apart by the possibility, he walks away, towards the hull of the ship.

* * *

Back in the lab, Tony and Banner are focusing on the monitors. "That's the guy my dad never shut up about? I'm wondering if they shouldn't have kept him on ice."

"The guy's not wrong about Loki. He does have the jump on us." Arabella says thinking hard to herself, watching the two men speak.

"What he's got is an Acme dynamite kit. It's gonna blow up in his face, and I'm gonna be there when it does." Tony says smirking.

"And I'll read all about it." Banner tells the two.

"Uh-huh. Or you'll be suiting up with the rest of us." Tony reminds him.

Banner chuckles, "Ah, you see. I don't get a suit of armor. I'm exposed, like a nerve. It's a nightmare."

"You know, I've got a cluster of shrapnel, trying every second to crawl its way into my heart." He points at the mini Arc Reactor in his chest. "This stops it. This little circle of light, it's part of me now. Not just armor. It's a… terrible privilege."

"But you can control it."

"Because I learned how."

"It's different."

Banner tries to read the computer screen, but Tony slides the data aside with his finger so the two can see face-to-face.

"Hey, I've read all about your accident. That much gamma exposure should have killed you."

"So you're saying that the Hulk… the other guy… saved my life? That's nice. It's a nice sentiment. Saved it for what?"

"I guess we'll find out."

Banner and Stark get back to work at their respective computers, Arabella leaves them to their work.

"You may not enjoy that." Banner says.

"And you just might." Tony retorts.

* * *

Down in the hull hanger, secure storage 10-C. Steve, with al his might, slides the heavy iron door and stealthily walks in. Secure storage 10-C is a large warehouse, filled with metal crates stacked. Steve looks up, seeing another level. He leaps up high and holds onto the catwalk railing. Steve continues to move forward.

* * *

Inside the back of a large van, Selvig and a few other soldiers are driving inside a long tunnel. With the CMS device inside, Selvig carefully picks up the small cylinder shaped Iridium with metal prongs and lightly places it in a slot inside the CMS. The CMS accepts it. Selvig looks at it, smiling devilishly.

* * *

Back inside the briefing room, on a SHIELD monitor is a photo and record of Jane Foster. Thor looks at her, remembering. With him is Agent Coulson and Arabella.

"As soon as Loki took the doctor we moved Jane Foster. They've got an excellent observatory in Tromso. She was asked to consult there very suddenly yesterday. Handsome fee, private plane, very remote. She'll be safe."

The God smiles at Coulson, "Thank you. It's no accident Loki taking Erik Selvig. I dread what he plans for him once he's done. Erik is a good man."

"He talks about you a lot. You changed his life. You changed everything around here."

"They were better as they were. We pretend on Asgard that we're more advanced, but we… we come here battling like bilge snipe."

Coulson raises an eyebrow, "Like what?"

"Bilge snipe? You know, huge, scaly, big antlers. You don't have those?"

"Don't think so."

"Well, they are repulsive. And they trample everything in their path."

Thor walks over to the side of the ship, next to Arabella, and looks out the window, both lamenting about what has happened and what may come.

"When I first came to Earth, Loki's rage followed me here, and your people paid the price. And now, again. In my youth, I courted war."

"War hasn't started yet." Fury says walking into the room, he looks to Arabella. "You think you can make Loki tell us where the Tesseract is?"

"I do not know. Loki's mind is far afield. It's not just power he craves, it's vengeance upon Thor. There's no pain would pries his need from him."

"A lot of guys think that, until the pain starts." Fury tells them.

Thor turns to him, "What are you asking me to do?"

"I'm asking, what are you prepared to do?"

"Loki is a prisoner."

"Then why do I feel like he's the only person on this boat that wants to be here?"

Thor doesn't answer, and Arabella takes her leave, it's time for a talk.

* * *

Loki walks back and forth inside his glass cell. Suddenly, he stops. "You always were able to sneak up on me."

He turns to find Arabella standing outside of the cell, her arms crossed over her chest. He takes in her outfit, quite different from what she had worn on Asgard. Black leather pants, green long sleeved peasant blouse that hung off her shoulders, and showed off her delectable skin. Black leather corset that hugged from below her breasts to her hips and flat soled Gypsy boots that laced up both sides, the excess laces hanging down giving her a very outdoors look.

She only stared as he looked her up and down as he had many times before. "But you were not expecting me, I think, but perhaps Agent Romanoff?"

"After. After whatever tortures Fury can concoct, she would appear as a friend, as a balm. And I would cooperate."

"You expected her to negotiate for Barton."

"Perhaps. Is that what you are here to do, Bella?"

She winced as his nickname for her rolled off his tongue as though it was meant to be there. "What have you done to Clint?"

"I'd say I've expanded his mind."

Arabella approaches the glass, "And once you've won. Once you're King of the mountain. What happens to his mind, Loki?"

The God smirks, "Is this love, Arabella? I once thought you held those feelings for me."

"Love is for children, he is my friend. You and I, are not of consequence at this moment Loki."

Loki backs up several steps and sits down on the bench across the room from her. "I sense that this visit has nothing to do with Barton at all."

Arabella pulls up a chair, sitting down her elbows resting on her knees as she leans forward. Her eyes find his. "I missed you."

Loki's gaze falters, his smirk dying on his lips. He does not speak, simply watches as her eyes roam over him.

"What did they do to you Loki?"

"Who?"

"The Chitauri." A blank stare is her response. "Do not pretend you don't know what I am speaking of Loki. I can see what others cannot."

"I do not know what you speak of Bella. Even if I did I would not discuss it with you."

"Why not? We used to share everything with one another. Does our history mean nothing to you?"

He does not answer, merely looks away from her.

"So be it, Loki." She stated with a heavy heart. "Why did you let yourself be captured?"

Loki chuckles, "What makes you think I let myself be captured? I was outmanned and unarmed, bested by your Man of Iron and Captain America."

Arabella narrowed her eyes at her former friend. "You cannot lie to me Loki, so why do you try?" Again no answer, she sighs. "Let Barton go."

"And what will you do if I vow to spare him?"

She smiles, "Not let you out."

Loki laughs, "Ah, no. But I like this. Your world in the balance, and you bargain for one man."

"I am bargaining for a friend, who would do the same for me. You and I both know regimes fall every day. What do I care? I'm neutral… or I was."

"And what are you now?"

"Is it really that complicated? I had to see you. I have done things I am not proud of, just as you have. There is just as much blood on my hands as yours. Nothing says you cannot go back."

"Can you? Can that much blood be forgotten? Barton told me everything you have done. I must say I'm impressed, I didn't think you like me, a killer. Your ledger is dripping Bella, like your wings. It's gushing red, and you think saving a man no more virtuous than yourself will change anything?"

Loki stands, now angry, "This is the basest sentimentality. This is a child at prayer… PATHETIC!"

_Tony and Banner continuously work at their monitors._

"You lie and kill in the service of liars and killers."

_Agent Hill checks every view screen in the bridge. Fury oversees._

"You pretend to be separate, to have your own code, something that makes up for the horrors. But they are part of you. And they will never go away!"

_Steve opens a steel crate. Angry, he looks behind him and looks back into the crate. The crate is filled with an array of Hydra weapons._

Loki slams his cell, making Arabella flinch. "I won't touch Barton. Not until I make him kill you! Slowly. Intimately. In every way he knows you fear! And then he'll wake just long enough to see his good work, and when he screams, I'll split his skull! This is my bargain, you mewling quim!"

Arabella turns around and walks away from Loki, disgusted. She speaks quietly, distraught. "You would do that to me? After everything you know I have went through… After what you witnessed…" She turns back to face him, "What has happened to you? Where did the man I cared for go? You're a monster."

Loki laughs, "Oh, no. You brought the monster."

Arabella frown curves into a grin, she stands poised. "So, Banner. That is your play."

Loki is staggered at her sudden change, from nearly crying to calm in an instant. "What?"

Arabella touches her right ear, "Loki means to unleash the Hulk. Keep Banner in the lab, I am on my way. Send Thor as well." She looks to Loki, smiling, "Thank you, for your cooperation, My Lord." She walks out leaving Loki frozen.


	7. The Battle Begins

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

* * *

Fury walks into the lab, surprised to see Tony and Banner working on the scepter. Angrily he asks, "What are you doing, Mr. Stark?"

"Uh… kind of been wondering the same thing about you."

"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract."

"We are. The model's locked and we're sweeping for the signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile." Banner tells him.

"And you'll get your Cube back. No muss, no fuss." Suddenly Tony's monitor show a collection of secret files. "What is Phase 2?"

Suddenly, Steve drops an Hydra assault rifle on the table causing Fury, Banner and Tony to turn around. Cap is pissed off.

"Phase 2 is SHIELD uses the Cube to make weapons." Cap turns to Tony, "Sorry, computer was moving a little slow for me."

Fury tries to explain, "Rodgers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're making…"

"I'm sorry, Nick." Tony tells him, moving the computer screen towards Fury which shows plans of the weapons.

"What were you lying?" Tony asks.

"I was wrong, Director. The world hasn't changed a bit." Cap says.

At that moment Thor, Arabella and Natasha walk into the lab. Natasha keeps her eyes right on Banner. He returns her stare, pissed off.

"Did you know about this?"

"You wanna think about removing yourself from this environment, Doctor?" Natasha suggests.

Banner scoffs, "I was in Calcutta. I was pretty well removed."

"Loki is manipulating you."

"And you've been doing what, exactly?"

"You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you."

"Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy. I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."

"Because of him." Fury points at Thor. "And her." He points at Arabella.

"Me?" Thor and Arabella speak together, pointing at themselves.

"Seven years ago, Earth had several visitors from Heaven, that attempted to kill a pregnant woman, killed several innocent people and blew up a diner/gas station." Fury looked pointedly at Arabella, who glanced unsteadily around the room meeting several pairs of eyes.

"Then last year, Earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."

"My people want nothing but peace with your planet."

"And I'm here to protect your planet."

"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And, you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled."

"Like you controlled the Cube?" Cap asks.

"You're work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies. It is the signal to all the realms that the Earth is ready for a higher form of war." Thor says.

"A higher form?" Cap asks.

"You forced our hand. We had to come up with something." Fury says.

"A nuclear deterrent. Cause that always calms everything right down."

"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?" Fury quipped.

After that it all spiraled out of control, everyone began accusing one another.

"I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep…" Cap says.

"Wait! Wait! Hold on! How is this now about me?" Tony yells.

"I'm sorry, isn't everything?" Cap asks him.

"I thought humans were more evolved than this." Thor announces.

"Excuse me, did WE come to YOUR planet and blow stuff up?" Fury retorts.

"You give your champions such mistrust?" Thor snaps back.

Arabella snaps at Fury, "You asked us all to be here. Why go to the trouble if you didn't trust us."

Natasha pipes up, "Are you really all that naïve? S.H.I.E.L.D monitors potential threats."

"Captain America's on threat watch?" Banner says unbelieving.

"We all are," Natasha tells them.

Tony stares at Cap, "Wait, you're on that list? Are you above or below angry bees?"

"Stark, so help me God, if you make one more wisecrack…" Cap threatens.

"Threat! Verbal threat. I feel threatened!" Stark cries.

* * *

As the "team" argues, they don't realize the blue gem on Loki's scepter is glowing brightly.

Outside the Helicarrier, a lone carrier slowly hovers over the ship.

"Transport 661 Bravo, please relay confirm codes. I've got you on the computer, but not on the day log. What is your hull? Over?"

"Arms and ammunition. Over." Barton's voice comes through the radio.

Inside Barton and his crew suit up and arm themselves. Barton pulls out his hi-tech bow and arrows.

* * *

Back in the lab, the egos of these people keep rubbing off of each other and at any moment, the shit will hit the fan.

"You speak of control, yet you court chaos." Thor says smiling.

"That's his M.O., isn't it? I mean, what are we, a team? No, no, no. We're a chemical mixture that makes chaos. We're… we're a time bomb." Banner says advancing on Fury.

"You need to step away." Fury tells Banner.

Tony puts his arm around Steve, "Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?"

Cap pushes Tony off, "You know damn well why! Back off!"

Tony comes face-to-face with Cap, "Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."

"Yeah. Big man in a suit of armor. Take that off, what are you?"

"Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist."

"I know guys with none of that worth ten of you. Yeah, I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."

"I think I would just cut the wire."

Cap smiles, "Always a way out… You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero."

That did it, Tony is ticked, "A hero? Like you? You're a laboratory experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle!"

* * *

Outside the ramp of the carrier opens. The carrier maneuvers next to one of the large turbine engines. Barton stands at the base, holding his bow. He pulls out a grenade tipped arrow. He points it right at the engine.

Then… Barton moves his aim and points the arrow about a hundred feet from the engine. He releases. The arrow flies out, but them sharply heads for the engine. The arrow punctures the engine, it has a visible timer which is counting down.

* * *

Back in the lab, Steve puffs up his chest at Tony, who just stands there, unmoving.

"Put on the suit. Let's go a few rounds."

Thor and Arabella laugh at them, Thor telling them, "You people are so petty… and tiny."

Tony rubs his head, moving away from Cap.

"Yeah, this is a team…" Banner starts to speak.

"Agent Romanoff, would you escort Dr. Banner back to his…"

"Where? You rented my room."

"The cell was just in case…"

"In case you needed to kill me, but you can't! I know! I tried!" He takes a deep breath, "I got low. I didn't see an end. So, I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good. Until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk!"

Banner slowly gets upset as he looks at Romanoff, who gets unnerved.

"You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm?"

Natasha and Fury have their hands down grabbing onto their guns.

"Doctor Banner… put down the scepter." Cap tells him.

Banner looks down and is shocked to see he's holding Loki's scepter. The computer beeps. They all turn to it.

"Got it." Tony says.

Banner puts down the scepter and walks over to the computer. "Sorry, kids. You don't get to see my party trick after all."

"You located the Tesseract?" Thor asks him.

"I could get there fastest." Tony says.

"Look, all of us…" Cap starts to say.

"The Tesseract belongs on Asgard. No human is a match for it." Thor tells them.

Tony turns to leave, but Steve stops him. "You're not going alone!"

Tony smacks his hand off, "You gonna stop me?"

"Put on the suit, let's find out."

"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."

"Put on the suit."

At that moment Banner who's looking at the monitors notices something about the Tesseract. "Oh, my God!"

* * *

Barton pulls the trigger on his bow, the arrow then explodes the engine of the Helicarrier.

* * *

Everyone is thrown in every direction. Steve, Tony, Fury, Arabella and Thor are thrown across the lab, as Natasha and Banner are thrown down in the lower equipment room. Steve looks up at Tony, "Put on the suit!"

"Yeah!"

Steve and Arabella help Tony up and out of the lab. Fury sits up clutching his ribs, he puts on his earpiece. "Hill?!"

* * *

Pandemonium erupts. Emergency alarms set off, fire extinguishers active near surrounding fires and ever Agent is in a spinning scramble for their positions and armaments. Agent Hill keeps the bridge as calm as possible.

"External detonation! Number 3 engine is down! Can they get it running?" She runs over to the man who was playing Galaga. "Talk to me."

He points to the monitor, "Turbine looks, mostly intact, but it's impossible to get out there to make repairs while we're in the air."

"We lose one more engine, we won't be. Somebody's got to get outside and patch that engine."

* * *

"Stark! You copy that?!" Fury yells into his earpiece.

"I'm on it!"

"Coulson! Initiate official lock down in the detention section then get to the armory! Romanoff?!"

* * *

Down in the lower equipment room Natasha's foot is caught below a beam. She looks over to Banner, who is breathing heavy, having landed hard. He is gripping the grated floor to maintain control, but his eyes are green, his face intense.

Natasha says quietly to herself, "We're okay. We're okay, right?"

* * *

Barton leads his men into the air ducts of the ship. They then rappel down into a corridor. "Keep that engine down! Dentition, wait for the cameras to go dark! Stay close."

Two of his men follow him, they head towards the bridge.

* * *

Tony, Cap and Arabella run through a dim, debris filled hall. "Engine three. I'll meet you there."

Cap and Arabella peel off as Tony approaches a tech room. Inside, Tony's Iron Man suit stands waiting, lit above in all its glory.

* * *

Banner's face in the dim light as he struggles to suppress the rage, but his face is growing, changing slowly. Natasha is pulling herself painfully free, talking to Banner… "Doctor? Bruce? You gotta fight it. This is just what Loki wants. We're going to be okay. Listen to me."

Two approaching SHIELD soldiers arrive to check on her. She furiously waves them away, they bolt out of there quickly.

"We're gonna be okay. All right? I swear on my life, I will get you out of this. You will walk away, and never, ever…"

"**Your life?**"

His voice has the change in it—the bitter amusement is morphing to a growled threat.

Natasha pleads, "Bruce."

Banner suddenly starts transforming into the Hulk and gives Natasha one last knowing look. Natasha struggles free of the rubble. She stops. The Hulk, sensing her, turns his head and puts on the face of a disturb monster. Natasha jolts up the stairs with the Hulk chasing after her. Natasha maneuvers like a Black Widow should. She rolls under a turbine, starts to crawl within the maze of pipes. The Hulk pulls them out from above the catwalk.

Natasha falls through under the catwalks, quickly and stealthily escaping. The Hulk lets out a roar of rage unlike anything. Primal. Not human.

* * *

Loki looks up, smiling mischievously as he hears the roar.

* * *

Fury runs onto the bridge and sees the chaos has increased even more than before. The helmsman is in complete disarray.

"Bring the carrier about to a 1-8-0, heading south! Take us to the water!"

"We're flying blind. Navigation's recalibrating after the engine failure." The helmsman tells him.

"Is the sun coming up?!"

"Yes, Sir."

"Then put it on the left! Get us over water! One more turbine goes down, and we drop."

* * *

Captain America, pushing with all his strength against the door to port side, sees SHIELD tech in full oxygen masks shoot fire extinguishers and cover from sparks—largely unable to do anything.

Engine 3 is totally dead, a large chunk of the port side is torn off.

"Stark, we're here!"

"Good. Let's see what we've got." Tony says flying in close to the damaged engine. Inside the suit Tony observes within his view screen the damaged engine and its layouts. "I gotta get this superconducting coolant system back online before I can access the rotors, and work on dislodging the debris." He looks down to Cap, "I need you to get to that engine control panel and tell me which relays are in overload position."

Iron Man flies into the giant cooling conductor. Cap jumps over to the other side of the broken railing, he gets himself to the control panel and opens it up. For a man who grew up as a yank, his first thought is, what the fuck is this!

"What's it look like in there?" Tony asks him.

"It seems to run on some form of electricity."

"Well, you're not wrong."

* * *

Natasha continuously crawls under the catwalk. She stops. Then—BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. The room vibrates. Rhythmically. Natasha pulls out her gun and slowly walks out onto the catwalk and spins.

…and then a ROAR. The Hulk. Natasha fires a shot into a liquid nitrogen pipe that hits the Hulk in the face. The Hulk smashes the shit out of it. Natasha begins to run through the maze of corridors. The sound of the monster is coming.

Finally, she reaches a long corridor. As she runs, behind her, the Hulk tears up the hallway, coming at her. Natasha turns to see, but the Hulk slaps her into the wall, smashing into the ground.

The Hulk marks his territory. Natasha looks up, a fear she has never felt begins to seep out. The Hulk raises his hand and is knocked off his feet by Thor who tackles him into the next room.

Both Thor and Hulk roll across the floor. Every person runs the hell out. Thor looks up at this magnificent beast. The Hulk stands up and moving like a boxer, wants Thor to make his move. The Hulk makes his move. Swing and a miss. Thor swings his massive hand and almost knocks Hulk off his feet. Hulk keeps swinging and missing, pissing him off. Finally, he brings his arm down, but Thor grabs it and wraps around it.

"We are not your enemies, Banner! Try to think!"

Hulk lifts his arm up, to Thor's surprise, and sends him flying as he punches Thor's face with his fist.

* * *

Iron Man continuously blasts broken debris off the turbine engine. It's bad, but still fixable.

"Okay, the relays are intact. What's our next move?" Cap asks.

"Even if I clear the rotors, this thing won't re-engage without a jump. I'm gonna have to get in there and push."

"Well if that thing gets up to speed, you'll get shredded!"

"That stator control unit can reverse the polarity long enough to disengage maglev and that could…"

"Speak English!"

"You see that red lever? It'll slow down the rotors down long enough for me to get out. Stand by it. Wait for my word."

Cap looks over at the side where he was, he sees the red lever and jumps towards it.

* * *

Back inside the Helicarrier aircraft port, Thor crashes through another stack of crates. As he raises his head, he feels something on his lips. Blood. As he swipes it off, the roar of the Hulk is not too far off. Thor extends his hand out. The roar gets louder and closer. Thor focuses. His hand strains toward mid-air, his eyes tight in concentration, the Hulk runs right at him. At the last second, Mjolnir flies into his hand and Thor uppercuts Hulk, who crashes into a fighter jet.

Hulk stands up, shaking his head like 'what the fuck just happened.' He shakes it off and angrily rips the tail off of the jet, torques his body like a Greek discuss thrower and hurls the massive plate at Thor. Thor slides and ducks under the tail. Jumping up, he throws Mjolnir with all his strength, knocking Hulk head over heels. Hulk falls down, hammer in hand. He tries to lift it, but can't. Mjolnir rests atop his hand.

Struggle as he may, Hulk wraps his hand around the hammer. The hammer doesn't move. To no avail— he strains with all his might, screams from the effort, bellowing. Thor jumps up again, kneeing Hulk in the face. Thor grabs his hammer, jumps on him, using the hammer as a lock for his choke hold. Hulk tries to pull him off.

* * *

On the bridge, Fury and Hill look over their monitors. Fury turns to Hill, "We need full evac on the lower hanger bay."

Agent Hill nods, she heads towards the exit, but a sliding grenade appears, "Grenade!"

The grenade goes off, sending her down the steps. Fury fires a shot at the open entrance, as he moves over behind the side of the entrance. A handful of Barton's men enter. Watchful, ready, waiting… Fury steps out, his gun drawn.

A shoot out and hand-to-hand ensues, but Fury is unable to stop one of them, which is why he is shot in the head by Agent Hill.

* * *

Inside the armory, Agent Coulson walks up to the armory door. He places his head into a facial recognition scanner, then walks into the room. Over his ear piece he hears, "We've got a perimeter breach! Hostiles are in SHIELD gear. Call-outs at every junction."

* * *

Back in the aircraft port, Hulk crashes from under the floor, sending Thor on his ass. Hulk grabs him by the neck.

* * *

On the bridge a gunfight opens up, Agents exchange fire with brutally efficient tactical soldiers.

"We have the Hulk and Thor on Research level 4. Levels 2 and 3 are dark."

"Sir, the Hulk will tear this place apart!" Agent Hill says.

"Get his attention." Fury says.

"Escort 6-0, proceed to Wishbone and engage hostile. Don't get too close."

"Copy."

* * *

Escort 6-0's jet banks to the right, heading towards the shuttle. Escort 6-0's pilot slowly makes his way in, and sees the action going between Thor and the Hulk.

"Target acquired. Target engaged." He pulls the trigger and fires the gun at Hulk.

A shower of bullets sprays the Hulk everywhere, as Thor ducks for cover. Hulk turns around, letting out his primal roar, he jumps up, takes a running start and leaps…

"Target angry, target angry!"

…Hulk lands on the jet's nose, the jet spins wildly. As the Hulk tears it apart, Escort 6-0's pilot pulls his ejection seat, but—the Hulk catches him, waves him around and then throws him away. Escort 6-0's pilot pulls his parachute, the jet explodes. The Hulk plummets to Earth, roaring his swan song.

* * *

Iron Man laser cuts a big piece of broken metal, he then jumps on it, relieving the rotors.

* * *

On the other side, Barton's men enter the port side. Captain America and Arabella look down, pondering if they are help, Cap looks to the red-head, "You think they're help?"

Before she can answer the SHEILD men begin shooting and throwing grenades at the two. Arabella hollers and ducks down behind a beam, "I'm gonna take a wild guess and say no!"

Cap jumps to the other railing and then down with Barton's men, as Arabella flies down. They begin to take out the men, even going as far as throwing several off. A few more enter, firing at the two. Suddenly Cap is enveloped by Arabella's wings. He hears the bullets bouncing off what sounds like metal, he looks quizzically at the red-head, who smiles, "Bulletproof."

Cap smiles, "Good to know."

Her wings release them, Cap grabs a Noveske Rifleworks Diplomat, which is a large word for 'big fuckin' gun,' and Arabella grabs Cap underneath the arms and flies them back up to their position, Cap firing down at them.

* * *

On the bridge the gunfight as gone down, but more of Barton's men enter and are taken by Fury, who is confused as to why they keep coming. "They're not getting through here, so what the hell…"

Suddenly, Barton shoots an arrow down to the bridge and explodes critical spots. Then he releases a multi-tipped arrow towards Fury, but instead hits his command desk, right above a USB outlet. Fury fires at Barton, but he's already gone. The arrow then self-activates and inserts itself into the outlets, hacking every single monitor and main frame. The hacking causes Engine 1 to shut off. Suddenly, the Helicarrier begins to dangerously tilt to one side.

"Sir, we've lost all power in Engine 1."

"It's Barton. He took out our systems. He's headed for the detention level. Does anybody copy?" Fury yells into his earpiece.

* * *

Still shaken by the Hulk ordeal, Natasha sits there, rocking back and forth, after crying for awhile. Summoning back all her coolness, she touches her earpiece. "This is Agent Romanoff. I copy." Natasha then springs up and runs for Barton.

* * *

Iron Man begins to push the rotor using boosters from his boots.

"Stark, we're losing altitude." Fury says.

"Yeah. Noticed."

The rotors start propelling faster and faster as Iron Man's boosters get more and more bright.

On the other side, Cap and Arabella continuously shoot at Barton's men, he using the gun and the Angel using fire, water, wind, and ice balls. Blinking at the wrong moment, Cap loses the upper hand and slides off the railing, but grabs a loose cable.

* * *

Thor runs into the detention section where he finds Loki, escaping. "No!" Thor charges his brother, Loki walks up to him and crouches down to attack. Thor only goes right through him, the false Loki dissipates into nothingness. The real Loki comes out from behind the cell door, which closes on Thor, locking him up as Loki smiles.

"Are you ever not going to fall for that?"

* * *

Barton walks alone down the catwalk, in a lightning fast move, Barton nocks an arrow, and turns around firing it at Natasha who dodges it. A hand-to-hand fight ensues. Natasha grabs Barton's bow fighting with him and causing him to let go of the bow, which she then takes but he quickly pulls out a knife.

* * *

Thor, in a fit of anger, slams Mjolnir onto the glass cell. To his surprise, the cell door only cracks, but violently shakes the ship. Loki stands there in caution, as does his guarding soldier. Loki smiles, walking over to the control panel, "The humans think us immortal. Should we test that?"

Suddenly, the guarding soldier falls down like a tree. Agent Coulson stands there, holding a Phase 2 weapon prototype. "Move away, please."

Loki moves away from the switch.

"You like this? We started working on the prototype after you sent the Destroyer. Even I don't know what it does." Coulson powers it up, "Do you wanna find out?"

A loud gasp is heard as Agent Coulson is impaled through the heart, the real Loki standing behind him.

"Nooo!" Thor yells loudly.

* * *

Arabella looks up hearing her friends pain laced voice, "Thor."

* * *

Loki sends Agent Coulson against the wall, he slumps down, breathing fast. Loki makes his way to the control switch. He gives his brother one last look. Thor looks at him, hopeful. Loki opens the hatch. Thor still hopes. Loki hits the button and drops Thor out of the ship.

* * *

Arabella looks out of the open area to see the cell plummeting to Earth, Thor trapped inside. Cap sees it too, "Go!"

"Are you sure?" She asks him.

"I'll be fine. Go, save him!"

Arabella nods running to the open area and diving towards the cell, her wings folded against her back sending her rocketing downwards.

* * *

Barton and Natasha continue attacking each other, Natasha kick boxes Barton's face. Feeling that, Barton takes a swing at her, but she grabs his arm, twisting it. Barton writhes in pain. Using his other arm, he tosses the knife over and begins to slash at Natasha. She dodges every move, but finds herself in a lock hold with him. As he forces the knife down, she bites his wrist, Barton lets go of the knife. Natasha wraps her legs around his neck, flips him over and arm locks him. She slams his head into a pipes rail. Barton goes down, hard. He looks up at her, almost coming to his real senses.

"Natasha…"

She coldcocks him, he's out.

* * *

Thor, trapped in the glass cage, bounces off the jumbling cell pod. As it draws closer to land, Thor tries to swing at the glass, but misses. The land draws closer. He looks up to see Arabella coming towards him, within twenty feet, her wings flare out slowing her descent. She studies the glass for a moment, thinking hard. It's supposed to impenetrable. She hits it with everything she has, nothing works. In a final attempt before crashing, Arabella coats a panel of the glass in ice, hoping Thor can break through it. Thor positions himself onto the glass door and leapfrogs just as the cage is about to hit the ground. The cell crashes into the shore as Thor crashes out onto the meadow.

Arabella lands next to him, "Well, that was fun."

Thor looks up, smiling at her, "You really are an Angel." They both laugh, Thor looks to the cage, "I guess SHIELD never counted on ice being used on their cage."

"I guess not. But just to be on the safe side, let's not tell them." The two share a nod and smile.

* * *

Loki has no remorse as he looks down, he closes the hatch and proceeds to leave.

"You're gonna lose." Coulson says in a weak voice.

Loki turns, "Am I?"

"It's in your nature."

"Your heroes are scattered. Your floating fortress falls from the sky… Where is my disadvantage?"

"You lack conviction."

"I don't think I'm…"

Coulson then shoots Loki with his Phase 2 weapon, causing Loki to be blown through the wall behind him. "So, that's what it does."

* * *

Back in the bridge, Fury sees on his view screen that the hatch has ben opened. Knowing Agent Coulson was sent there, he goes too.

* * *

Iron Man continuously spins Engine 3, giving it all he has. The rotors are propelling properly and fast, the Helicarrier levels out.

"Cap, hit the lever!"

"I need a minute here!"

"Lever, now!"

Tony lets go of the rotors, they spin by themselves. Tony is caught in one, he is now fucked. Iron Man slips into the rotors, getting chewed up by them.

Cap climbs up the loose cable and reaches the railing. Barton's man opens fire once more, as Cap pulls himself up and finally pulls the lever.

A vent opens up from Engine 3, Iron Man falls out, but the suit is heavily damaged, hardly keeping him up. Iron Man heads for Cap. Barton's man turns his aim to Iron Man, who tackles him into the wall. Iron Man rolls over, tired. Cap lets out a sigh of relief.

* * *

The carrier that brought Barton and his team now leaves, flying off into the distance, taking Loki and his scepter.

* * *

Fury runs in finding Agent Coulson still alive, barely. Coulson looks up, "Sorry, boss. The God rabbited."

"Just stay awake. Eyes on me!"

"No. I'm clocked out here."

"Not an option."

"It's okay, boss. This was never gonna to work… If they didn't have something…. To…" Coulson looks away, sighing his last breath. Fury looks grimly at him, as the medical team arrives.

"Agent Coulson is down."

* * *

On the bridge Agent Hill is being treated for a gash on her forehead, she listens in on her headset, standing up.

Another SHIELD Agent reports, "Paramedics are on their way."

"They're here." Fury reports. "They called it."


	8. Bringing the Party

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers, Legion or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

Fury gathers Tony and Steve back into the briefing room. Everyone there has a look as if in a daze, a look of numb shock is shown on their devastated faces.

"These were in Phil Coulson's jacket. Guess he never did get you to sign them." Fury says, throwing Coulson's Captain America trading cards on the table towards Steve. Steve picks them up, stained with blood.

"We're dead in the air up here. Our communications, location of the Cube. Banner, Thor, Arabella… I got nothing for you. Lost my one good eye. Maybe I had that coming. Yes, we were going to build an arsenal with the Tesseract. I never put all my chips on that number though, because I was playing something even riskier. There was an idea, Stark knows this, called the Avengers Initiative. The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people, see of they could become something more. See if they could work together when we needed them to, to fight the battles that we never could. Phil Coulson died still believing in that idea. In heroes."

Tony gets up and walks off, not wanting to hear it anymore.

"Well, it's an old-fashioned notion." Fury says.

* * *

Thor and Arabella walk out far into the meadow, they look down. Mjolnir lays at their feet.

* * *

Banner wakes up, in human form. He looks around and sees he is in a pile of rubble and looks up at the open ceiling he crashed in. He's completely naked. A security guard stands there, amazed.

"You fell out of the sky."

Banner comes to, "Did I hurt anybody?"

"There's nobody around here to get hurt. You did scare the hell out of some pigeons, though."

"Lucky."

"Or just good aim. You were awake when you fell."

"You saw?"

"The whole thing, right through the ceiling. Big and green and buck-ass nude. Here…"

He throws Banner a pair of big pants, Banner pulls them on.

"I didn't think those would fit you until you shrunk down to a regular-size fella."

"Thank you."

A beat goes by, "Are you an alien?"

"What?"

"From outer space, an alien?"

"No."

"Well then, son, you've got a condition."

* * *

Arabella arrives back on the Helicarrier, she hears the news about Coulson. Natasha approaches her, letting her know they have Barton. "I thought you'd want to know."

Arabella smiles, nodding she heads down to the medical room, inside Barton is strapped down. Arabella sits down, watching over him as he tries to shake off Loki's mind control.

"Clint. You're gonna be alright."

"You know that?" He chuckles. "Is that what you know?" Arabella gets up walking over to the container by the door beside Barton's head, pouring him a glass of water. "I got… I've got no window. I have to flush him out."

"You got to level out. It's gonna take time."

"You don't understand. Have you ever had someone take your brain and play? Pull you out and stuff something else in? Do you know what it's like to be unmade?"

"You know that I do."

"Why am I back? How did you get him out?"

"Cognitive recalibration. Natasha hit you really hard in the head."

"I gotta tell her thanks."

Arabella unfastens the restraints, Clint eyes her. "Angel… How many Agents did I…"

"Don't. Don't do that to yourself, Clint. This is Loki. This is monsters and magic, and nothing you were ever trained for."

"Loki, did he get away?"

"Yeah. I don't suppose you know where?"

"I didn't need to know. I didn't ask. He's gonna make his play soon, though. Today." Clint sits up grabbing the glass of water while Arabella stands near the door.

"We gotta stop him."

"Yeah? Who's "we"?"

"I don't know. Whoever's left."

"Well, if I put an arrow through Loki's eye socket, I would sleep better, I suppose."

"Now you sound like you." Arabella sits next to her friend.

"But you don't. You're an Angel, not a soldier. Now you want to wade into a war. Why? What did Loki do to you?"

"He didn't, I just…" She pauses.

"Angel."

"It's a long complicated story… Maybe I'll tell you some day."

* * *

In the detention section, Tony stares at the empty cell container. He stands not saying a word. Steve walks in leaning against a rail, "Was he married?"

"No. There was a uh… Cellist, I think."

"I'm sorry. He seemed like a good man."

"He was an idiot."

"Why? For believing?"

"For taking on Loki alone."

"He was doing his job."

Tony scoffs, "He was out of his league. He should have waited. He should have…"

"Sometimes there isn't a way out, Tony."

Tony walks away, "Right. I've heard that before."

"Is this the first time you lost a soldier?"

Tony turns around sharply, "WE ARE NOT SOLDIERS! I'm not marching to Fury's fife!"

"Neither am I. He's got the same blood on his hands that Loki does. But right now, we've got to put that behind us and get this done. Now Loki needs a power source, if we can put together a list…"

Tony looks at the blood stained wall, "He made it personal."

"That's not the point."

"That is the point. That's Loki's point. He hit us all right where we live. Why?"

"To tear us apart."

"Yeah, divide and conquer is great, but he knows he has to take us out to win, right? That's what he wants. He wants to beat us, he wants to be seen doing it. He wants an audience."

"Right. I caught his act at Stuttgart."

"Yeah, that was just previews. This is… This is opening night. And Loki, he's a full-tilt diva, right? He wants flowers, he wants parades. He wants a monument built to the skies with his name plastered…." Tony pauses thinking, then, "Son-of-a-bitch!"

* * *

Selvig works around the CMS device that has already been set-up on the rooftop of Stark Tower.

* * *

Steve walks into the room in full uniform, Arabella and Natasha look up at him, surprised.

"Time to go."

"Go where?" Natasha asks.

"I'll tell you on the way. Can you fly one of those jets?"

Barton walks out of the bathroom, he looks at Cap, "I can."

Steve looks at the women, they nod their heads to confirm Barton's on their side.

"You got a suit?" Steve says looking to Barton.

"Yeah."

"Then suit up."

* * *

A melody of things happen next; Krakakaboom! A blinding bolt of lightning strikes down from above, colliding on Mjolnir. The explosion is massive. The Mighty Thor.

Arabella spreads her massive wings, stretching them out. She holds her hands out testing her gifts, making small balls of each element in her palms.

Captain America pulls on his helmet and shield.

Tony welds his helmet, light slips down over the eye holes.

Black Widow attaches a glove gauntlet with her rounds on her wrist. A blue light charges.

Hawkeye slips on his quiver of arrows.

* * *

Cap, Widow and Hawkeye walk towards and into the Quinjet. A young SHIELD pilot looks up and stands in their way. "You are not authorized to be here…"

Cap steps up, "Son… Just don't."

* * *

Fury looks out the window of the ship, contemplating. Agent Hill walks up to him. "Sir."

"Agent Hill."

"Those cards, they were in Coulson's locker, not in his jacket."

"They needed the push." Fury says holding Coulson's cards.

A loud noise screeches, Fury looks out to see Iron Man and Arabella flying off, as well as the Quinjet. "They found him. Get our communications back up, whatever you have to do. I want eyes on everything."

"Yes, Sir."

* * *

Iron Man arrives at Stark Tower where Selvig, activates the CMS device holding the Tesseract.

"Sir, I've turned off the arc reactor, but the device is already self-sustaining." Jarvis tells him.

"Shut it down, Dr. Selvig."

"It's too late! She can't stop now. She wants to show us something! A new universe."

"Okay."

Iron Man aims his hands towards the CMS and fires. The energy from his boosters shatters with a deafening crack. Selvig falls backwards. Down below, citizens of New York look up at Stark Tower. Iron Man stares in disbelief at the CMS… Unharmed.

"The barrier is pure energy. It's unbreachable." Jarvis tells him.

"Yeah, I got that." Tony's eyes travel down below him where Loki stands smirking. "Plan B."

"Sir, the Mark VII is not ready for deployment."

"Then skip the spinning rims. We're on the clock."

Tony lands his suit and goes through the gauntlet and unsuits himself. Loki looks up at him, smiling as he walks inside the other door opposite Tony. They proceed to walk into the penthouse. Loki walks in, holding the scepter, while Tony casually walks down the steps, towards the bar.

"Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity."

"Uh… Actually, I'm planning to threaten you." Tony says.

"You should have left your armor on for that."

"Yeah. It's seen a bit of mileage and you've got the uh, glow stick of destiny. Would you like a drink?"

Loki looks down at the scepter smiling, then laughs. "Stalling me won't change anything."

"No, no, no! Threatening. No drink? You sure? I'm having one."

Loki grows impatient and walks over to the window gazing up at the sky. "The Chitauri are coming. Nothing will change that. What have I to fear?"

"The Avengers." Loki looks at him, confused. "It's what we call ourselves. We're sort of like a team. "Earth's Mightiest Heroes"-type of thing."

"Yes, I've met them."

Tony smiles, "Yeah, it takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one. But, let's do a head count, here. Your brother, the demi-God; an Angel, with an impressive set of wings and control of the four elements; a super solider, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend. A man with breathtaking anger-management issues; a couple of master assassins, and you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them."

"That was the plan."

"Not a great plan. When they come, and they will, they'll come for you."

From underneath the bar table, Tony pulls on Colantotte bracelets, a honing device.

"I have an army."

"We have a Hulk."

"I thought the beast had wandered off."

"You're missing the point. There is no throne. There is no version of this, where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damned well sure we'll avenge it."

Loki slowly walks up to him, raising the scepter, "How will your friends have time for me, when they're so busy fighting you?" Loki taps Tony on the chest with his scepter. PING! Nothing. Confused, Loki tries again. PING! Nothing.

"This usually works."

"Well, performance issues, it's not uncommon." Tony smirks. "One out of five…"

In anger, Loki grabs Tony by the throat and flings him across the room.

"Jarvis, anytime now."

Loki grabs Tony by the throat again.

"You will all fall before me."

"Deploy!" Tony says before Loki throws him out of the window, Tony freefalls down the tower. From behind Loki, an elevator opens and a red pod shoots out knocking Loki over. The pod laser signals the Colantotte bracelets on Tony. The pod begins to transform into the Mark VII suit. It latches onto Tony transforming him into Iron Man, he gains control and flies up just before he hits a crowd of gazing people. He flies back up to the penthouse, Loki looks up, angry.

"And there's one other person you pissed off! His name was Phil."

Loki raises the scepter, Tony fires at Loki, sending him on his ass.

* * *

Selvig looks up at the sky, the Tesseract's energy beams into the sky. The beam then forms a vortex, which then opens up another portal.

A hole in space rips open, and from it, the Chitauri army spills out in flying chariots, carrying energy rifles with a bayonet on the end.

"Tony!" Arabella hollers gaining his attention, his eyes follow her arm up to where she points at the sky.

Inside the suit Tony looks up, "Right. Army."

Iron Man flies up towards the portal. From his shoulders, a miniature multiple rocket launcher pops out and fires. Like the Jericho missile, several targets are taken down at once. Arabella flies up next to him hitting every Chitauri she can see with balls of elements. It's useless. Thousands of Chitauri fly out, as Iron Man and Arabella fly towards the city.

* * *

The Chitauri unleash, New Yorkers fill the streets, staring at the fire fight in the distance. BOOM! The Chitauri unleashes blasts as it goes, blowing up cars, setting storefronts aflame. An explosion rips out the windows of the top corner of buildings. Flame and stone rain down. A domino-effect of explosions rippling across the bridge.

* * *

Loki walks onto the balcony, his armor materializing as the sounds of the Chitauri rings out. He admires his soon to be kingdom. Thor lands on the tower, Loki turns to his enemy.

"Loki! Turn off the Tesseract, or I'll destroy it!"

"You can't. There is no stopping it. There is only the war!"

"So be it."

Loki and Thor rush at each other, they and their weapons collide. The two battle—Loki unleashing a lifetime worth of pent-up rage and jealousy, Thor having no choice but to defend himself.

* * *

Soldiers and cops have taken positions covering the streets, they see from the sky, Iron Man leading a trail of Chitauri towards his tower.

* * *

The Quinjet booms into the city, Natasha on the radio. "Stark, we're on your three, headed northeast."

"What? Did you stop for drive-thru? Swing up park. Angel and I'll lay 'em out for you."

Iron Man banks around his tower, he sees Thor and Loki still going at it. Iron Man swoops down the street, causing a Chitauri to crash. Flying up, Iron Man puts the following Chitauri in view of the Quinjet. Black Widow takes out a machine gun and fires at the Chitauri.

"Sir, we have more incoming." Jarvis radios.

"Fine. Let's keep them occupied." Iron Man heads back to the portal.

* * *

On the tower Thor and Loki battle savagely as Arabella flies over the roof of Stark Tower, the Quinjet behind her. Inside the jet, Hawkeye is following her, he looks out of his left window, finding a target. "Nat?"

"I see him." Widow says.

Hawkeye banks the jet towards Stark Tower, and aims the mini-gun at Loki. Loki aims the scepter at the Quinjet and fires a blast of energy. Thor gets to his feet, tackling Loki down hard.

The Quinjet is soon caught completely on fire. Hawkeye maneuvers one wing of the jet. They spin and slow, dropping out of the air as it passes over skyscrapers. Then… Their rapid descent is slowed, Hawk looks out his window to see Arabella next to them. Hawk can feel the air beneath them slowing them, as they hit the street all they receive is a small jolt.

With everyone okay, Hawk and Widow unfasten their seat belts and open the ramp. Cap runs down, followed by the two assassins, each of them with their respected weapons in hand.

"Thanks for the lift, Angel."

"Anytime Hawk."

"We got to get back up there," Cap says leading them down the street.

The quartet arrives in the middle of a four-way street. Suddenly, the city lurches to a stop. A deep, primal rage bellows out. With that roar, a shadow comes over them. From the portal, a Chitauri Leviathan flies out, carrying hundreds of soldiers, and passes right over them.

They look up, out of their element. From both sides, Chitauri soldiers cling off and attach themselves to the sides of buildings, sliding down. Some crash into these buildings and begin firing from their energy rifles at innocent people.

"Stark, are you seeing this?" Cap asks.

"I'm seeing. Still working on believing. Where's Banner? Has he shown up yet?"

"Banner?" Cap says.

"Just keep me posted. Jarvis, find me a soft spot." Tony says as he flies behind and parallel with the Chitauri Leviathan.

* * *

Back on the tower, Thor holds down Loki's face straight ahead, forcing him to watch the city falling to ash. "Look at this! Look around you! You think this madness will end with your rule?"

Loki tries to look away, "It's too late. It's too late to stop it."

"No. We can, together."

Loki looks up at his brother, showing a sign of hope. Then—Loki stabs Thor with a small knife. Thor keels over.

"Sentiment."

Thor gets up, kicks Loki and lifts him into the air. Thor then slams him down, hard. Loki, bleeding, rolls over the edge. Thor looks down. Loki lands on a Chitauri chariot, dozens of Chitauri follow his lead.

* * *

Arabella takes to the sky again as the trio below her run behind a taxi, taking cover.

"We've got civilians trapped up there." Hawk indicates up on a nearby building.

They look up and see Loki taking his band down the street, firing at the street in a chain of explosions. Smashing cars and hurling people as it goes. It culminates in one final conflagration. Terrified people run from Loki, looking over their shoulders, coming straight for the trio.

"Loki." Cap looks down from the bridge, "They're fish in a barrel down there."

Chitauri soldiers have landed near them and begin firing, Black Widow pulls out both pistols firing back, she turns to Cap. "We got this. It's good. Go!"

Cap turns to Hawk, "You think you can hold them off?"

Hawk smiles, "Captain." He turns a dial on his bow, an arrow is mechanically chosen. "It would be my genuine pleasure." He turns shooting an arrow into a creature's head, gaining a few seconds for Cap as he jumps down from the bridge followed by an explosion. Cap races over to the plaza, jumping over dozens of exploding cars.

Hawk runs over to a bus filled with people. From the windows, small children are held by their parents for Hawk to pull them out to safety. He runs over to the jammed door and jerkily opens it. People begin to run out as he makes his way back over by Natasha. She empties out her clips as Hawk fires arrows into the ranks of the Chitauri, hitting his mark each time he shoots.

"Just like Budapest all over again!"

Hawk raises an eyebrow at the assassin, "You and I remember Budapest very differently."

* * *

The cops continuously fire at the flying chariots, it's pretty pointless. A young cop runs over to his Sergeant. "It's going to be an hour before they can scramble the National Guard."

"National Guard? Does the Army know what's happening here?"

"Do we?"

Cap jumps down in front of them, they look up at this ridiculous looking man.

"You need men in these buildings. There are people inside and they're going to be running right into the line of fire. You take them to the basements or through the subway. You keep them off the streets. I need a perimeter as far back as 39th."

The Sergeant eyes the man, "Why the hell should I take orders from you?"

Suddenly, an explosion comes up from behind Cap, he blocks an energy blast with his shield. Two Chitauri soldiers attack and the cops watch in shock as Captain America fights them off with ease.

The Sergeant turns to his officer, "I need men in those buildings. Lead the people down and away from the streets. We're gonna set up a perimeter all the down to 39th street."

* * *

Iron man swerves around a building and faces the Chitauri Leviathan. He pulls out his miniature multiple rocket launcher and fires causing the Leviathan to roar in annoyance and turn following him. Tony yells at Jarvis as he flies away, "Well, we got its attention. What the hell was step 2?!"

"Step 2 was get the hell out of there before it swallows you!"

Tony looks up as Arabella soars over his head then banks back coming to fly at his side. "I knew you liked me."

Arabella can hear the smirk in Tony's voice, even visualize it on his face underneath the helmet. "Watch it Tony, don't make me tell Pepper about you flirting with me."

"I have done no such thing."

The two of them share a smile as they bank back and forth around buildings, the Leviathan closing on them from behind.

* * *

Hawk trips a soldier and rams an arrow down its throat. Black Widow gets her hands on an energy rifle and proceeds to fight the soldiers. Cap joins back in and using his shield, swaps and whacks oncoming soldiers. It's all too much on them, until…

Suddenly, the soldiers are frozen in their places by a wave of ice. Lightening strikes down from the sky, channeling the blast, firing the electricity out at the soldiers around them. They're blasted back by a massive shockwave. The soldiers convulse then drop dead to the ground. Thor and Arabella touch down in front of the group.

Cap steps up to them, "What's the story upstairs?"

"The power surrounding the Cube is impenetrable." Thor admits.

Tony's voice breaks through their ear pieces, "Thor's right. We got to deal with these guys."

Natasha eyes them, "How do we do this?"

"As a team." Cap tells them.

"I have unfinished business with Loki."

Arabella steps up next to Thor, "As do I."

"Yeah. Well, get in line." Barton tells the God and Angel.

Cap steps up, "Save it. Loki's gonna keep this fight focused on us and that's what we need. Without him these things could run wild. We got Stark up top. He's gonna need us to…"

Just then, Banner arrives on a small motorbike, he gets off, looking around at the city. "So, this all seems horrible."

"I've seen worse." Natasha admits.

"Sorry." Banner says feeling bad about what happened on the Helicarrier.

"No. We could use a little worse."

"Stark, we got him." Cap says into his earpiece.

"Banner?"

"Just like you said."

"Then tell him to suit up. I'm bringing the party to you." Tony flies out from behind a building, the Leviathan following, impatiently.

The rest of the Avengers look up, getting ready and standing still. Natasha and Arabella share a glance before the assassin speaks. "I… I don't see how that's a party…"

Iron Man swoops down the street, the Leviathan follows, barreling down the street like a freight train that keeps building and building its intensity. Banner looks behind at the others then begins to head towards the monster.

"Dr. Banner. Now might be a really good time for you to get angry."

"That's my secret, Captain. I'm always angry." Banner's body starts to swell and stretch and harden. Green shoots through his body as the Hulk emerges and smashes the Leviathan in the nose causing it to do a 180. Iron Man, in mid-flight, extends his arm out with a rocket ready to shoot. He fires— the rocket hits a soft spot, large pieces of the Leviathan are blown completely away. Real pain is heard from the creature as other pieces of meat catch fire and withdraw…. Sizzling as they hit the pavement. Cap raises his shield to block Natasha.

From above and on the buildings, the Chitauri Army watches in horror as a group of Earth's Mightiest Heroes find themselves united against a common threat. To fight the foes no single Super Hero could withstand. The Avengers assemble!


	9. A Fallen God

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers, Legion or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella, her backstory and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

**Thank you to Narsilia Lyanna Elendil for the review. No I haven't written a Legion story with Arabella, but given it is a part of her backstory I am going to very soon.**

**Reviews are appreciated!**

* * *

Loki watches from above, motionless. "Send the rest."

* * *

From the portal, thousands more of Chitauri soldiers and even more Leviathans fly out. The Avengers look up. Way out of their fucking element.

Black Widow looks up, "Guys."

"Call it, Captain." Tony says.

"All right, listen up. Until we can close that portal, our priority is containment. Barton, I want you on that roof. Eyes on everything. Call out patterns and strays. Stark, you got the perimeter. Anything gets more than three blocks out, you turn it back or you turn it to ash."

"Can you give me a lift?" Hawk asks turning to the Man of Iron.

"Right. Better clench up, Legolas." Tony lifts Hawk up to the corner of the building.

Down below Cap turns to the others. "Thor, Arabella, you got to try and bottleneck that portal. Slow them down. You got the elements. You got the lightning. Light the bastards up."

Thor and Arabella fly off towards the portal. Cap turns to the last two, "Natasha, you and me, we stay here on the ground. We keep the fighting here. And Hulk... Smash."

The Hulk smiles a most magnificent grin and leaps, soaring high up onto the nearest building, Hulk runs up the wall and hits several soldiers, snapping them in half. He dives towards a building on the other side of the street, throwing the dead soldiers towards other soldiers. The soldiers fire at him, he backhands them, seizes them and with raw power, throws them down. In his most powerful leap yet, the Hulk flies up and is in the middle of a flying chariot traffic jam, to which he smacks them out of altitude.

* * *

Up in the sky Thor grabs onto the Empire State Building, raises Mjolnir and KRAKAKABOOM! A blinding bolt of lightening strikes down from above, colliding on Mjolnir. Thor aims this massive shockwave towards the portal. He channels the blast and fires the electricity out at the soldiers flying out of the portal. They're blasted back in a massive shockwave. They convulse, dropping dead to the ground. He even rips a Leviathan, which then explodes.

Below him Arabella flies around the bottom of the portal killing any soldier that manages to escape Thor's blast. One by one they dissipate to ashes from a fireball or smash to the ground shattering into pieces from an ice ball.

* * *

Back in the bridge of the Helicarrier, Fury sees on his view screen the destruction going on in New York. Agent Hill walks up to him, "Sir. The Council is on."

Oh shit! Fury turns on his screen.

* * *

Atop the rooftop, Hawk fires arrows into the streaming flow of Chitauri riders, hitting his mark each time.

"Stark, you got a lot of strays sniffing your tail."

"I'm just trying to keep them off the streets."

"Well, they can't bank worth a damn." Barton aims his bow behind him, without looking and releases an arrow, exploding a rider. "So, find a tight corner."

"I will roger that."

Iron Man does so and leads the Chitauri towards tight corners and into Hawk's view, who fires arrow upon arrow, exploding the Chitauri riders. Iron Man keeps leading the riders under tunnels, and through open parking garages. He looks back. None left.

"Nice call. What else you got?"

"Well, Thor and Bella are taking on a squadron down on 6th."

"And they didn't invite me?"

* * *

Inside a conference room office workers sit around a table. But noise catches one worker's eye, then another, and soon they are all rising, stepping to the window, mesmerizing by what lies beyond. A Chitauri Leviathan swims right in front of them.

Suddenly, another noise catches the worker's attention. The Hulk crashes through their floor, slashes his way through the room and jumps out onto the jaw of the creature. The Leviathan heads down trying to wave off the Hulk.

* * *

Black Widow, using the energy rifle, is taken off her feet by a soldier. She tiresomely takes it down by cutting its throat. She grabs the energy rifle and turns to attack. Cap stands there, holding his shield up. She slumps back, tired.

"Captain, none of this is gonna mean a damn thing if we don't close that portal."

"Our biggest guns couldn't touch it."

"Well, maybe it's not about guns."

"Well, if you wanna get up there, you're gonna need a ride."

"I got a ride. I could use a boost, though."

Natasha drops the rifle and backs up giving herself a running start, while Cap lifts and angles his shield.

"Are you sure about this?"

"Yeah. It's gonna be fun."

Natasha runs at Cap, doing a parkour move, using her feet to run up the car and jump up on Cap's shield, who gives her a boost up, she grabs onto a flying chariot. She climbs up onto the chariot and cuts the turret shooter's linkage to it. She then jumps on the rider and sticks her knives into his nervous system. She gets him to bank over to a building.

* * *

Iron Man arrives and shoots any other riders following her. He makes his way down to Cap, who is fighting off more soldiers. Iron Man points his boosters at Cap's shield, the energy comes off and Cap uses it as a reflection beam and takes down nearby soldiers.

From above them, Hawk sends down his remaining arrows, sending one across the street, taking down a rider following Iron Man.

* * *

Finally we have Thor, Arabella and Hulk fighting on top the back of a Leviathan, tearing it apart and fighting soldiers. Hulk breaks off a massive piece of armor and slams it down onto the spine of the creature. Arabella flies in front of the creature, she raises her arms and coats the creature's face with a sheet of ice, blinding it. On top, summoning all his strength, Thor raises Mjolnir, drawing lightening to it from all sides, and brings it down with a final, terrible blow—

The Leviathan crashes into a history museum. Dead. Thor and Hulk stand on the back of the creature after bringing it down. They stand still, admiring. Without warning, Hulk punches Thor with his enormous hand. Thor goes flying. Hulk smirks.

* * *

On top of Stark tower, Selvig wakes up from Loki's mind control. He looks around, confused where he is. He looks up at the sky, amazed.

* * *

Down on the bridge street, several Humvees aim their mounted .50 Cal guns into the sky, firing and hitting the Chitauri riders.

Captain America fights off a soldier who is pinning him down with its energy rifle. Cap breaks its leg. He stands up, picking up his shield as Hawk's voice floats into his earpiece.

"Captain, the bank on 42nd past Madison. They've cornered a lot of civilians in there."

"I'm on it."

* * *

Inside the bank dozens of civilians are gathered, tension and uncertainty surround them. Three soldiers oversee them, pointing their weapons at them. One of them charges a bomb, it beeps.

Cap jumps through the window and throws his shield at the bomber. The other two soldiers take aim at him with their rifles, but Cap heads for cover under a desk, which he then kicks at them. He jumps over the desk, headlocks a soldier, while backhanding another one over the railing. The crowd moves away.

"Everyone! Clear out!"

A soldier attacks him from behind and rips off his helmet, the bomb is beeping faster now. Cap flips over the soldier, grabs his shield and just as the bomb is about to go off, the bomber dives for it, trying to stop it, but it goes off, sending Cap through the window, landing very hard on a car. The civilians look up from below, they're okay.

Cap gets off the car, looks around the city. Destroyed. The Police and Firemen arrive, pulling out those civilians he saved. A waitress looks back, thankful.

* * *

Arabella flies as fast as her wings will carry her, banking around buildings, a group of Chitauri riders on her tail. She dives straight down, the Chitauri follow, she pulls up in the nick of time just barely missing the ground below as she skims underneath an overpass. Behind her she hears the telltale sound of an explosion and she knows that several of the riders just became a permanent fixture in the asphalt.

She quickly ducks down an alley the Chitauri slamming into the side of the building. She looks back with a smile, "Hawk was right, they can't bank worth a damn."

Just as she exits the alleyway she is slammed in the side by a pulse of blue light, her body folds up on itself as she is propelled by the massive force of the hit. She crashes into the side of a building, her body penetrating the thick wall before she makes a violent connection with the floor. Her body rolls like a ragdoll across the entire open floor of the building. Just as Arabella begins to gather her bearings she collides into a floor to ceiling window. She registers her weightlessness and the blue sky above her as her body plummets over five story's to the ground below. Her descent is stopped viciously and brutally as she lands on top of a car. The force of her impact shatters every pane of glass in the vehicle as her body violently shoves the roof into the car.

Arabella lies there immobile, every inch of her immortal body in pain. She registers a presence hovering above her through half-slit blurry eyes. By the chuckle she knows it is Loki.

"Oh, Bella. How the Angel has fallen. We could have been so good together, unstoppable. You could have ruled at my side, had anything your heart desired. Instead you chose to betray me, and for what? That buffoon Thor? You are royalty, you should be living in a palace. Instead you choose to live here with this pathetic race? Why? What makes them worth your life?"

"I'm an Angel."

Loki is suddenly slapped out of mid air by a giant vine that had grown behind him without his knowledge. He slammed into the ground about fifty yards from where Arabella lay. Groaning he shoved himself up and after glancing down the street to where his Angel lay he motioned to one of the riders who swooped down and picked him up taking him back to Stark tower.

* * *

Back on the bridge of the Helicarrier, Fury sees the World Security Council on his view screen.

"Director Fury, the Council has made a decision."

"I recognize the Council has made a decision. But given that it's a stupid-ass decision, I've elected to ignore it."

"Director, you're closer than any of our subs. You scramble that jet…"

"That is the island of Manhattan, Councilman. Until I'm certain my team can't hold it, I will not order a nuclear strike against a civilian population."

"If we don't hold them here, we lose everything."

"If I send that bird out, we already have." Fury says before shutting off his view screen.

* * *

Natasha still driving the chariot with the rider, is hit at her side. She looks about, wondering whose energy fire it was, she looks behind. "Oh, you."

Loki follows her in hot pursuit, they race downward, trailing between buildings. They race madly, driving and dodging.

"Hawkeye."

Hawk looks at Natasha, astonished. "Nat, what are you doing?"

"Uh… a little help!"

Hawk pulls the trigger once, nocks an arrow, and points it at Loki, smiling. "I got him." He fires. The arrow streaks down the city, straight at Loki's head…

SNATCH! Like a cat, Loki grabs the arrow straight out of the air not even looking at it… He then looks straight at Hawk, smiling…

BOOM! The arrow explodes in Loki's face, crashing him into the Stark Penthouse pad.

Natasha looks down and building her momentum, she jumps off the chariot, landing on top of Stark Tower, rolling herself to the edge.

Loki looks up, shocked at what just happened. The Hulk leaps up and kicks Loki, hurtling him through the glass window of the penthouse. He collapses as he hits the wall, the Hulk jumps in ready to attack.

Loki rolls himself up in a flurry of broken glass, standing up to the Hulk. "Enough! You are, all of you, beneath me! I am a God, you dull creature. And I will not be bullied by…"

Hulk grabs Loki by the legs and smashes him against the floor repeatedly like a ragdoll and finally throws him aside to the ground, flattening Loki. Hulk walks away, "Puny God."

Loki whimpers in pain.

* * *

Back on Stark tower Natasha approaches the CMS machine cautiously. Selvig, slumped down on the ground, weakened, looks up at her desperately. The Tesseract's energy is firing towards the portal, gaining in strength, at the surge of energy moving through the sky.

"The scepter."

"Doctor."

"Loki's scepter. The energy… The Tesseract can't fight, but you can't protect against yourself."

"It's not your fault. You didn't know what you were doing."

"Well, actually, I think I did. I built in a safety to cut their power source."

"Loki's scepter."

"It may be able to close the portal." Selvig looks down, he sees a gold gleam. "And I'm looking right at it."

* * *

Thor rides on top of a chariot, smacking several riders with the hammer. As Thor takes the reigns, a Leviathan crashes through a building, knocking him down to where Cap is fighting off soldiers.

Iron Man flies right next to the Leviathan and aims his laser booster at it. Nothing.

"Sir, we will lose power before we penetrate that shell."

Tony flies up ahead, facing the oncoming monster. "Jarvis, you ever hear the tale of Jonah?"

"I wouldn't consider him a role model."

Iron Man flies towards the Leviathan, unleashing every arsenal on his suit. The creature opens it's mouth and Iron Man flies in and bursts out the other end, making the creature collapse. Tony rolls down the street, the wind is knocked out of him. He looks up with an overwhelming sigh as a small band of soldiers rush towards him, holding out their rifles.

* * *

Hawk turns and fires his last arrow, then using his bow as a staff, he knocks a soldier down, kicking it over the edge of the building. He yanks his last arrow off the dead body of a soldier. He places it back in the quiver and presses the trigger fitting another head onto the arrow. Hawk jumps off the side of the building, grabbing the arrow he nocks it and fires his grappling arrow up into the side of the building. Falling down, Hawk finds the momentum and swings himself into a building, through a glass window and rolls over in pain.

After letting the pain dissipate from his body, he stood up stepping over to the window, staring down, a wave of panic swept through his body as he saw Bella below him lying motionless on the top of a car.

* * *

"Bella can you hear me? Bella open your eyes."

Arabella opened her eyes the bright sun assaulting her sensitive nerves, she made out the figure of Hawk kneeling over her. With his help she sat up, her body wobbling as she tried to regain her bearings. She shoved herself to her feet which proved to be a mistake as her legs gave out underneath her, Hawk wrapped his arms around her waist steadying her.

"Whoa. Slow and easy Bella. Slow and easy."

Arabella smiled up at Hawk as she clung to his arms. "No way, you know me Clint, I'm a rough and fast kinda woman."

A slight blush crept up Barton's cheeks and ran to the tips of his ears turning them red. Arabella loved how just the tips of his ears turned red when he was embarrassed, so naturally she tried to make him blush whenever she could. With one arm tightened securely around her waist the two of them started walking back towards Stark Tower.

* * *

The Hulk holds soldiers by the face and slams them down. More keep coming. Hulk looks up, hundreds of riders hover over him. Then… they begin to fire energy blasts. Hulk takes them like he's running through a light rain. Blocking the stream of streaking blasts, as though swatting at bees.

* * *

On the deck of the Helicarrier, a lone pilot sits in his cockpit, listening. "Director Fury is no longer in command. Override order, 7-Alpha-1-1."

The pilot radios back, "7-Alpha-1-1, confirmed. We're go for takeoff." He ignites his engine.

* * *

Back in the bridge, Agent Hill sees on her screen 7-Alpha-1-1 preparing to leave. "Sir, we have a bird in motion! Anyone on the deck, we have a rogue bird! We need to shut it down! Repeat, take off is not authorized!"

Fury runs out onto the deck, holding a fucking airtronic RPG-7. He takes aim and fires, hitting the tail end of the jet. The jet skids off towards the edge. Pilot unharmed.

Suddenly, another jet flies off. Fury stands there, knowing he can't do anything about it.

"Stark, do you hear me? You have a missile headed straight for the city."

"How long?"

"Three minutes, max. The payload will wipe out Midtown."

Iron Man fights off as many soldiers as he can sustain. "Jarvis, put everything we got into the thrusters!"

"I just did."

Iron Man leaves the streets flying high into the sky.

The jet arrives outside the city, he flips the switch to press the button. He presses it and the missile takes off towards Manhattan. "Package is sent. Detonation in 2 minutes, 30 seconds, mark."

* * *

Cap and Thor battle, side to side, throwing their respected weapons. Thor catches Mjolnir, but as Cap turns, an energy blast strikes him down hard. Thor runs over to a broken car, swings the hammer and flips the car over and over onto it's side, crushing a few soldiers. Cap tries to get back up, he looks up to Thor's outstretched hand. He grasps it and Thor helps him back to his feet. Cap raises his shield back up.

"Are you ready for another bout?" The God asks.

"What? You getting sleepy?"

* * *

Selvig, back in scientist mode, clacks away at his laptop. "Right at the crown!" He nods at the assassin, who picks up Loki's scepter and slowly breaks into the force field, almost touching the Tesseract.

"I can close it! Can anybody copy? I can shut the portal down!"

"Do it!" Cap yells to her.

"No, wait!" Stark tells her.

"Stark, these things are still coming!" Cap says urgently.

"I got a nuke coming in. It's gonna blow in less than a minute. And I know just where to put it."

Tony catches up to the missile from behind, grabbing onto it and gripping it tightly.

"Stark, you know that's a one-way trip?" Cap tells him concerned.

"Save the rest for the turn, J."

"Sir. Shall I try Miss Potts?"

"Might as well."

* * *

Inside Tony's jet, Pepper, along with her crew, watched on TV, in horror, the destruction of New York. On the table, her cell phone is vibrating, with Tony's picture on it.

* * *

Back in the bridge, every single agent holds their breath as they too watch Iron Man fly up into the portal.

* * *

With a mighty effort, he wrenches the rocket off its course just before hitting Stark Tower. Steering it from underneath, he accelerates quickly, flying straight up into the sky, towards the portal. Iron Man climbs higher and higher over the city, gaining speed, suddenly flings himself through the portal.

Every single agent cheers, as Fury smiles, then he tries to communicate with Tony. Nothing.

Communications die. The suit begins to freeze. Tony looks on in horror at the armada before him. The black sky is filled with what must be ninety ships in a vague cluster. Most of them hang still in the air. Some move swimmingly about. Tony lets go of the missile, it whistles off into the blackness as Tony falls idly back down the portal's opening. The missile reaches the main ship, it implodes causing the entire armada to burst into a supernova, creating a spectacular heavenly display.

Suddenly, all of the Chitauri soldiers and Leviathans keel over and begin to shake, then stop. They all fall over, dead. The Avengers look up at their consultant, not sure if he'll make it through.

Still holding the scepter in hand, Black Widow shifts around, waiting. "Come on, Stark…

Thor and Cap see the supernova coming towards them, the God nods to Cap who radio's Widow, "Close it."

Without hesitating, Natasha plunges the scepter into the Cube. The Tesseract instantly turns off its energy beam. The portal quickly closes. A small figure is hurled backwards out of the now closed portal. Iron Man, plummeting to the earth.

Cap looks up with a smile, "Son of a gun!"

Iron Man continues falling as the group watches him. Thor turns to Cap, "He's not slowing down."

Thor swings Mjolnir around ready to fly up, but just as he does, Hulk snags Tony out of the air, both crashing and sliding down a building. Once on the ground, Hulk throws Tony off of him. Thor, Cap and the newly arrived Hawk and Arabella run over to their fallen friend.

"Is he breathing?" Cap asks as Thor rips off Tony's helmet.

He appears to be dead. They stand around not sure. Then… Hulk yells in fury, the noise startles Tony awake.

"What the hell? What just happened? Please tell me nobody kissed me?" His eyes move from the men to Arabella. "Unless you did, then it's okay."

The Angel rolls her eyes at her friend, "He's fine."

"We won." Cap informs him.

"Alright. Hey. Hurray. Good job, guys. Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day. Have you ever tried shawarma? There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I wanna try it."

Thor eyes Stark Tower where Arabella has flown up to Tony's penthouse. "We're not finished yet."

A beat passes before Tony speaks, "And then shawarma after."

* * *

Loki crawls onto the stairs, looking like a piece of shit rag doll. He takes a few breathers, senses someone is behind him. He turns to find Arabella standing there, her arms crossed over her chest. Then he notices the rest of the Avengers standing behind her staring at him, pissed. Hawk kneels on the ground beside the Angel, his bow loaded, pointed at the fallen God. Loki grimaces in pain as he moves. "If it's all the same to you, I'll have that drink now."

Hulk snorts at him.


	10. Going Home

**I do not own Marvel, The Avengers, Legion or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella, her backstory and anything else that seems out of place.**

**So here is the final chapter of the Avengers. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say t****hank you to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.**

**The next story in the Fallen Angel series will be my take on what happens between the Avengers and The Dark World. It is called, Fallen Angel: Return to Asgard.**

**Reviews are appreciated!**

**xoxo Tiearney**

* * *

Weeks later inside the SHIELD Analytical room there is a news montage about the Avengers. They show various reports of what happened, some people agree that the Avengers did good, protecting the city, and others believe it was their cause.

"Superheroes? In New York? Give me a break!" An old man announces.

Senator Boynton is on camera next. "These so called "heroes" have to be held responsible for the destruction done to the city. This was their fight. Where are they now?"

The waitress that Steve saved is seen in an interview. "What? That this is all somehow their fault? Captain America saved my life. Wherever he is, and wherever any of them are, I would just… I would want to say thank you."

* * *

The next day in Central Park, the Avengers take Thor and Loki, who is handcuffed and muzzled, to a blocked area.

Arabella prepares to say goodbye to Thor but he stops her with a smile. "Come with us."

"What?"

"You belong on Asgard, with us." Arabella starts to speak but the God places a finger on her lips, "I have already cleared it with Allfather. In fact it was his idea. He and Frigga think of you as a daughter. Besides…" Thor glances over at Loki whose eyes are downcast. "He needs you."

Arabella's face registers shock at Thor's assumption. "He is a different man around you. Better. Perhaps you can find the good man inside."

Her eyes shift to Loki who looks up at her, his face that of a man condemned, which he was. But there was something else in his eyes at that moment. Hope. In that moment Arabella had made her decision, she turned to Thor with a smile and a nod.

She turns to say goodbye to her friends, making her way around in a circle. As she nears Clint her throat gets tight.

"Leaving again?"

"Yeah." The two friends share a smile. "Unless you can give me a reason to stay?"

Clint smiles, as much as he wanted to, it just wasn't the right time. He tucked her hair back behind her ear, "Not right now."

She nodded, "I figured."

The two hug one another before Clint pulls something from behind his back handing it to Bella. She gasps seeing his bow and quiver in her hands, full of arrows. "No, Clint I can't."

"Please. I promised you I'd get you one. I want you to have mine."

She smiles running her hand over the bow lovingly. She steps towards him, lightly kissing his cheek before whispering in his ear. "Thank you."

"Don't forget me."

"Never."

Arabella moves back, standing next to Loki, she straps on the quiver and bow settling them on her back. As she watches Thor say his goodbyes, a voice enters her head. "You're coming back for me?" She smiled, even though he was muzzled Loki could still make himself heard. "Only to watch you suffer." She smirked as his eyes flashed, anger coursing through him as she heard a nice string of explanative words fly through his mind directed at her. Oh how she loved to rile him up.

Thor shakes hands with his team and gives Selvig a hug. Selvig opens the Tesseract's case and Banner takes it out and places it inside a glass tube, held by Thor. Thor gives Loki the other end, who reluctantly takes it. Arabella stands in between the Gods holding their hands, as Thor twists the end and the Asgardians are lifted away by the energy beam. Gone.

Then one-by-one, the group splinters off, strolling into different directions. Banner climbs in with Tony in his sports car. Steve rides away on his Harley. Natasha and Clint climb back into SHIELD cars. They all part. For now.

* * *

Fury is facing once more members of the World Security Council.

Council member #3, "Where are the Avengers?"

"I'm not currently tracking their whereabouts. I'd say they've earned a leave of absence."

Council member #2, "And the Tesseract?"

"The Tesseract is where it belongs: out of our reach."

Council member #1, "That's not your call."

"I didn't make it. I just didn't argue with the God that did."

Council member #1, "So you let him take it and the war criminal, Loki, who should be answering for his crime?"

"Oh, I think he will be."

Council member #1, "I don't think you understand what you've started, letting the Avengers loose on this world. They're dangerous."

"They surely are, and the whole world knows it. Every world knows it."

Council member #1, "Was that the point of all this? A statement?"

"A promise." Fury says before walking out, towards the bridge.

* * *

Fury and Agent Hill walk together, toward the window looking out into the world.

"Sir, how does it work now? They've gone their separate ways. Some, pretty extremely far. If we get into a situation like this again, what happens then?"

"They'll come back."

"Are you really sure about that?"

"I am."

"Why?"

"Because we'll need them to." Agent Hill turns around, Fury looks out, smiling.

* * *

Tony and Pepper reveal a new design for Stark Tower. On the outside of the building all the letters have been blown away, all that remains is a giant A.


End file.
